NGRP 120 Deaf Printing History: Articles

Levi Backus was among this country's pioneers in Deaf education. An early graduate of the Hartford, CT School for the Deaf, Backus became a teacher in New York upon his graduation from the school. While there he met members of an Upstate family attending the school as boarders. In 1824, that family and several others in the region established a school in the town of Buel. That school hired Backus to teach Sign language. A few years later and after a short period of training as a printer, Backus printed both Sign Language alphabet and this paper, partially signed. (See Masthead.) He was the first American printer to do so.