FOREWORD


IN the summer of 1879 the writer who had lately completed his
course as a pupil at the Kentucky School for the Deaf was re-
quested by the then newly appointed Superintendent, Mr. David
C. Dudley to examine and sort out several basketsful, of old letters
and papers that had accumulated in the school office during half
a century. The bulk of these papers I found of no value but scatter-
ed among them were letters and papers of the greatest interest from
the light they threw on the early history of the school. From these
I took copious notes which I later embodied in a history of the school
which was published in 1892. Since that date the school has grown
very much larger and the approaching centennial of its foundation
makes appropriate the publication of a new edition of the history
and to this end I have for some years diligently sought all data that
would throw further light on the subject.
      My object in writing this history has been not so much to
write an interesting and entertaining narrative as to put on record all
facts in regard to the inception, establishment and growth of the
school during its first century that I have been able to ascertain
so that those who in future years may be interested in the subject
will have a reliable source from which they may obtain the inform-
ation they may desire. To this end I have been at great pains to in-
sure accuracy. My sources of information have been the annual re-
ports of the school; files of the school paper, The KENTUCKY
STANDARD; official records in the State Capitol and the Boyle Court
House; contemporary letters and documents and my personal re-
collections. Where, in the few instances that tradition or hearsay
was the source, the fact is so stated.
      The work has been a labor of love and a testimonial of the
deep affection that I, in common with practically all its former pupils,
entertain for the Kentucky School for the Deaf.
                                           CHAS. P. FOSDICK.
Danville, Ky., April 11, 1923.