by Samuel M. Genensky, Ph.D.
(Editor’s Note: The following story of Samuel M. Genensky’s life was submitted by Richard A. Rueda, a member of the National Alliance of Blind Students {NABS}, the California Council of the Blind {CCB}, and ACB’s summer 2000 intern. We agree with Richard that this is a very inspiring narrative, and thank him for bringing Genensky’s story of courage and determination to our attention.)
My story begins in the Saint Luke’s Hospital in New Bedford, Mass. on July 26, 1927. That was the day of my birth, and that was the day on which silver nitrate was put into both of my eyes in compliance with the then existing requirement by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to carry out this procedure on every child born in the commonwealth in order to prevent the possible passage of syphilis from mother to child. In my case, unfortunately, the silver nitrate put into my eyes had not been diluted, and, as a result both of my eyes were badly burned. The procedures followed in the hospital after this accident also left much to be desired.
In the fourth month of my life I was taken to Boston to be seen by the man who even then was regarded as the father of American ophthalmology, Frederick H. Verhoeff. Dr. Verhoeff performed partial iridectomies on both of my eyes to prevent additional loss of vision due to glaucoma. The result of all this history was that I was left with no vision whatsoever in my left eye and a best-corrected visual acuity in my right eye of 20/1000.
My formal education began in the first of two sight-saving classrooms in New Bedford’s Sylvia Ann Howland School. That classroom catered to partially sighted students, some of whom were also legally blind, and covered grades one through four. The other sight-saving classroom covered grades five through eight. Fortunately for me and my classmates, our teachers were not obsessed with saving sight. They permitted each of us to perform in class using everything that we had going for us including our remaining eyesight. In these classrooms we were taught to read ink-printed material, to write with a pen or pencil, to do arithmetic, to acquire a good knowledge of geography and to learn some history.
I participated in the sight-saving classes during the period 1933-1940, and in those days the only visual aids available to us were simple eyeglasses in wire frames, large print books with dark bold type and pieces of chalk that were about 1.5 to 2.0 inches in diameter and about 4.0 inches long which we used to write on large slate chalkboards. The large print books and the oversized chalk were helpful to me, but corrective eyeglasses were of no value to me whatsoever.
I completed the eight-year program at the Howland School in seven years, and at the end of the seventh year my mother and I went to see the superintendent of schools in New Bedford, Mr. Keith. I asked Mr. Keith for permission to attend New Bedford High School, and he told my mother and me that he felt that it would be better if I were to go to the Perkins Institution for the Blind in Watertown, Mass. So in the fall of 1940, my parents drove me up to Watertown and thus began my year at Perkins.
Perkins is a very beautiful school housed on a piece of land that rolls down to the bank of the historic Charles River. There I was taught braille and typing and I continued my academic studies. I learned braille rather rapidly, acquiring a full knowledge of grade one and grade two in a matter of a few months. This delighted my teachers, but when they observed that I continued to read ink-printed material and to write with a pen or pencil with my nose in the book I was reading or down on the paper upon which I was writing, they were mystified. One of my teachers even said to me, “Why don’t you act like a well-behaved blind child?” to which I replied, “Because I am not blind.”
Little did I know at the time how profound this response was, because, via it, I placed myself in the camp of the sighted and not in the camp of the blind. I now became determined that I would make it in life using everything that I had going for me including my none too impressive residual vision.
In the spring of the year that I was at Perkins, my mother went again to see the superintendent of schools in New Bedford, but when she got there, she found out that Mr. Keith was no longer there and that she was to meet with the acting superintendent of schools. She met with him, and told him that I was not happy at Perkins and that I would like to have permission to attend New Bedford High School. After hearing her request, the gentleman told her that if I wanted to do this, he would be happy to allow me to do so. My mother was delighted and expressed her thanks. The gentleman then said, “My name is Sadler and my sister Irene Sadler taught your son in grades one through four. Since she feels that your son can succeed in our high school, far be it from me to disagree with her.”
So, in the fall of 1941, I entered New Bedford High School. There I spent four exciting and satisfying years. During the first year and a quarter, I had no visual aids available to me. Hence, when my teachers wrote on the large slate chalkboards, I could not see what they wrote. I was aware that my classmates viewed the chalkboards and copied from them or took notes on what was written on them.
In the fall of my sophomore year, for what reason I don’t remember, I brought my father’s World War I binoculars to school, and in my geometry class I used them to look at the chalkboard. Much to my amazement and delight, with them I saw the triangles and circles, letters and numbers that my geometry teacher, Mr. Felton, had written on the board. After class Mr. Felton came to me and asked me how the binoculars had worked. When I told him what I had seen with them, he encouraged me to bring them to class every day and to bring them to all of my other classes.
Shortly after this great eye-opening event, my mother and I drove up to Hanover, N.H. and I was seen at the Dartmouth Eye Institute. While there I met Dr. Kenneth Ogel, who, upon hearing about my success with binoculars, suggested that I put a +3.00, +3.50 or a +4.00 diopter lens over the left objective lens (i.e. the large lens on the left side of the binoculars) in order to turn the binoculars into a giant bifocal system that would allow me to look (with my right eye) at the chalkboard with the right optical system of the binoculars and look down the left optical system of the binoculars (again using my right eye) at the paper on my desk in order to copy down or take notes on what I had seen on the chalkboard.
I used this giant bifocal optical system throughout my remaining years at high school, throughout my undergraduate and graduate years at college and when employed as a mathematician at the U.S. Bureau of Standards from 1951-1954 and later at the Rand Corporation in Santa Monica, Calif. It is interesting to note that about three months after I began using the augmented binoculars in high school, my grades in my academic subjects rose from three B’s and one C to three A’s and one B. No, I had not grown a new neurological network in my head, but I now had a means to see much more than I could prior to using the binoculars.
In the fall of 1945 I entered Brown University in Providence, R.I., and in the late spring of 1949, I graduated from Brown, magna cum laude, with a bachelor of science degree in physics.
While at Brown I asked for only one concession because of my very limited eyesight. I asked that I be allowed to take my final examinations in a room determined by me and the college to be acceptable, that had good lighting, and that was equipped with a chair and desk or table that were of heights that would permit me to work comfortably. I made it clear that I wanted no extra time and I expected to take my examinations at the same time as my classmates. Such a room was found for me in the oldest building on the campus, University Hall 1770. It may also be of interest to know that I did all of my own reading and note taking. It wasn’t always easy, but it sure was satisfying.
In the fall of 1950 I entered Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass. and in the late spring of 1951 I was granted a master of arts degree in mathematics from that university. From Harvard I went to work for the U.S. Bureau of Standards in Washington, DC as a mathematician in the Fire Protection Section of the Building Technology Division. While at the bureau and in the spring of 1952 I was encouraged to learn to program for the third oldest digital computer in America, Standards Eastern Automatic Computer (SEAC). It may turn out that I was the first legally blind programmer in America.
After leaving the bureau in August 1954, I returned to Brown University and for the next four years worked on earning a Ph.D. in applied mathematics.
In the fall of 1956 our nation was concerned with the fact that the Soviet Union had put up a satellite before us, and the U.S. was determined that it would compete successfully with that nation. This led to a frantic search for engineers, physicists, mathematicians, and chemists, and our government and our private industry were, as it were, hiring these people by the cubic foot. Even so, it turned out that obtaining employment in one of these professions was all too frequently an unavailable opportunity for severely visually impaired persons. I know of this fact from personal experience.
However, the picture was not entirely dismal. I recall discussing the problem with one of my professors, Gordon Newell, and telling him of my negative experience in dealing with Standard Oil of California. He told me not to be discouraged and to continue looking.
Unbeknownst to me, one of my other professors was in the room and listening to our conversation. That professor, William Prager, met me the following day, and told me that a friend of his, named John Williams, would be in town soon and it would be to my advantage to meet with him. I thanked Professor Prager for this information, and when Mr. Williams came to Brown, I met with him. It turned out that he was the head of the mathematics department at the Rand Corporation in Santa Monica and that he was looking for young Ph.D.’s in mathematics for his department. He handed me an application and told me to look it over. I noted that the fifth question on the application was, “Do you have a handicapping condition?”.
I asked Mr. Williams what I should do with that question. He totally ignored me and went on speaking. Somewhat later when we had gotten to know each other better, I again asked him what I should do with the question. This time he said, “Oh! Please walk over to that window.”
I felt that this was a strange answer, but I complied. He then asked me to return to my chair and went on talking. Somewhat later I said, “John, you have a great organization, and if you were to ask me to join your department I would seriously consider doing so, but I still really want you to tell me what to do with question 5.”
He then said, “Sam, if I hire you to be a member of my department, I won’t hire you because you don’t see very well, I won’t hire you because you went to Brown, but I will hire you because I perceive that you have something between your ears and because I feel that you have something to contribute to what Rand is trying to do to assist the U.S. Air Force and the Atomic Energy Commission.” That was a terrific answer, and every qualified disabled person should receive an answer like it when he/she seeks employment.
I was hired by Rand and I became a member of the senior staff of its mathematics department in the summer of 1958. While at Rand I not only did mathematics, but I also became involved in other problem areas of interest to the company. It was while working in one of these problem areas and while slumped over an inclined drawing board in an attempt to write that I received a visit from my colleague, Paul Baran. Paul observed what I was doing and said, “There has to be a better way for you to read and write.” I told him that I agreed and asked if he would join me in trying to find that better way. He said that he would and together with other Rand colleagues and professional friends at Aerospace Corporation and the Polaroid Corporation, we succeeded in designing and building the first practical and user-friendly closed-circuit TV (CCTV) system for the partially sighted. We showed that prototype system at the 1968 annual meeting of the American Academy of Optometry, which was held at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif. Via an article written by George A.W. Bohem, entitled “Sam Genensky’s Marvelous Seeing Machine” that appeared in the January 1971 issue of “Reader’s Digest,” the world learned of our work.
I received thousands of letters as a result of this article and hundreds of people came to the Rand Corporation to see and try our prototype device. From those people I learned that I was not alone in recognizing that partially sighted people were receiving services that were at best suitable for the totally blind or were receiving no help at all. I concluded that neither of these alternatives was satisfactory, and that a third alternative was needed. I therefore began working on that alternative and came up with the design of a center that would provide partially sighted people with a set of services that were designed to meet their special needs and that would encourage them to use all of their sensory capabilities including their residual eyesight to remain or become an integral part of the overall society.
I received an opportunity to turn this thinking into concrete reality in 1975, when the medical staff of the Santa Monica Hospital in Santa Monica, Calif., invited me to create such a center at the hospital and to bring my own money to do so. I moved with two of my colleagues to the hospital in the fall of 1976, and with their help and the help of colleagues back at the Rand Corporation, obtained funds from the federal government in the fall of 1977 to create and operate a Center for the Partially Sighted.
This center began providing services in the spring of 1978 and went on its own as a non-profit, tax exempt, public benefit California charitable corporation in April 1983. The center has served more than 14,000 individuals since it came into existence.
Remembering my years at the Rand Corporation I recall with a smile on my face the many times I walked down the hall in search of a restroom. Now in those days the room doors of Rand were unpainted and blonde in color and the doors that led into restrooms had, at eye level, blonde plastic signs that were about three inches long and one and one-half inches high, into which were cut the word “men” or “women” as appropriate. To read these signs, I was obliged to bring my right eye to within an inch of them. All too frequently when I did this, the sign said “women;” a woman would open the restroom door and I would explain that I could not see well and had to get very close to the sign on the door to determine whether the door led into a men’s or ladies’ restroom. Sometimes I think the lady believed me and sometimes I think she thought I was some kind of weirdo.
The problem came to a head when the friendly guards in the lobby said to me good-humoredly, “Sam, we hear that you are smelling restroom doors.” That did it, and as a result I came up with a scheme for marking restroom doors and restroom entrances that is now used in all new and renovated public buildings in California. So the next time you see or feel a triangular or circular restroom sign in a public building in California, think of me; I am the character who had them placed there so that you and I could find the appropriate restroom without being embarrassed.
While I found my years at the Rand Corporation to be very exciting and stimulating, I can honestly say that the years that I spent developing CCTV systems, creating and running the Center for the Partially Sighted, and creating the signage that allows us to find the appropriate restroom in a public building have been the most enjoyable and satisfying years of my professional life.