The Opening Chapter: the history of library services for Canadians who are blind, deafblind, and partially sighted

In Canada, public libraries have been around in one form or another for about 200 years. On January 4, we celebrate the birthday of Louis Braille. Born in 1809, Louis Braille invented his famous system of reading 400 years after the invention of the printing press. In this first episode on the evolution of library services, the Triple Vision team talks to CNIB archivist Jane Beaumont about the founding of the Free Library for the Blind. This service eventually became the Canadian National Institute for the Blind’s library until it evolved into the Centre for Equitable Library Access. Joining Jane on this podcast is library user Albert Ruel, who talks about the variety of methods he uses to access his books. “I had done some research on audiobooks. It was fascinating to me to see that really this has just come full circle. We’ve come back to the way humankind was before the Gutenberg press. We are back to storytelling, the oral traditions. That’s part of our DNA that hasn’t evolved out of us yet.”