Helen Who?

     You would never know Alabama was home to a founder of the American Civil Liberties Union based on the relatively small showing at an event in Montgomery yesterday to celebrate the 100th Anniversary of the founding of that organization.

      I had not heard about it till the 5:00PM newscast back at work, and popped down for a visit. The event had been going on all day, so perhaps more visitors had been there early.
     Anyway, the Alabamian who helped start it was none other than Helen Keller. 

People who object to her social activism are quick to allege that she was "used" to promote causes that she couldn't possible agree with.

"In 1909 Keller joined the Socialist Party, wrote articles in support of its ideas, campaigned for its candidates, and lent her name to help striking workers. Although she was universally praised for her courage in the face of her physical disabilities, she now found herself criticized for her political views. The editor of the Brooklyn Eagleattacked her radical ideas, attributing them to “mistakes sprung out of the manifest limitations of her development.” In her 1912 essay “How I Became a Socialist,” published in the Call, a socialist newspaper, Keller wrote, “At that time, the compliments he paid me were so generous that I blush to remember them. But now that I have come out for socialism he reminds me and the public that I am blind and deaf and especially liable to error.”

                           ( Source: https://boingboing.net/2015/04/20/helen-keller-feminist-radica.html )

Perhaps late on a Tuesday afternoon was not the best time to visit....Montgomery as one of a dozen or so cities where the exhibit was installed for a day.

The people working at the event were friendly and helpful. 
More advance publicity would have helped. The Montgomery Advertiser had not a word that I could find. Alabama News Network did report on the event. And that other station too. 

As mentioned in an earlier post, a statue of Keller is to be installed in that little triangular city park at the foot of Dexter Avenue in Montgomery. on the grounds of the capitol building,