by Oral O. Miller
On October 21, 2000, Dr. John W. Sutton, an active member of the American Council of the Blind and a lifelong advocate in behalf of blind and visually impaired people, died in Salisbury, Md., following a long illness.
Dr. Sutton, a native of Maryland and a graduate of the Maryland School for the Blind, received his B.A. degree from Washington College, his master’s degree from the University of Louisville and his Ph.D. from the University of Texas, after which he was appointed to a position as the first visually impaired psychologist employed by the U.S. Veterans Administration (now the Department of Veterans Affairs). While serving on the staff of the Veterans Administration for 41 years, he worked both in the office and outside the office as an advocate for and counselor of blind and visually impaired people. He joined the American Council of the Blind in the 1970s through the New Jersey affiliate, and as a way of underscoring his interests in the objectives of ACB, over the next 25 years he joined several other ACB affiliates as his professional and/or personal business took him to other parts of the country, e.g., Virginia, the District of Columbia, Maryland and Alaska.
Following his retirement from the Veterans Administration, he returned to his native Maryland and began an extremely busy life as an advocate, counselor and educator. In recent years he served as chairman and co-chairman of the ACB Committee on Concerns of the Older Blind, and was a founding member of the Alliance on Aging and Vision Loss. At the time of his death at age 75, he was a member of ACB, the Alliance on Aging and Vision Loss, the Association for Education and Rehabilitation of the Blind and Visually Impaired, the American Psychological Association, several community visual support groups, the Wicomico County Commission on Aging, the mayor of Salisbury’s disability council, the advisory committee to the rehabilitation service program at the University of Maryland-Eastern Shore, the Maryland Governor’s Council on Disability, the Advisory Council of the Maryland Technical Assistance Program, the American Board of Professional Psychology, the National Register of Health Care Service Providers, the National Association of Retired Federal Employees, and the American Association of Retired Persons.
One of the truly meaningful testimonials given at the very well attended memorial service for Dr. Sutton on October 28, 2000, was the presence of many elderly blind citizens who had met him and benefitted from his counseling and encouragement at the various peer support groups with which he had been associated in the community. Dr. Sutton is survived by his wife of 25 years, Eloise (“Ellie”) Rita Sutton.
The people who attended the memorial service for John Sutton had met him over the years in many different capacities and under many different circumstances. However, there was one person present who had met him several decades earlier under truly unique conditions. What most of the people present did not know was that, while earning his master’s degree at the University of Louisville, John, who had been an accomplished athlete while at the Maryland School for the Blind and Washington College, had “earned his board and keep” by working as the wrestling and track coach at the Kentucky School for the Blind. Yes, John was my coach the year I entered high school in Louisville.