At the age of 15, Louis created the Braille language
He received his instruction from French Army Captain Charles Barbier at the Royal Institution for Blind Youth. He discussed his "night writing," which was a form of silent combat communication used by soldiers. This system was extremely complex and was made up of dots and dashes. However, it encouraged Louis Braille to develop a new kind of speech. He had streamlined "night writing" by the time he was 15 years old. This involved reducing 12 dots to 6 dots.
He labored tirelessly on his Braille system for two years before completing it in 1824. He removed unnecessary details from what he had seen from Captain Charles Barbier and substituted dots for the embossed letters. He had devoted all of his spare time to locating this quick-and-easy system. To try it out, Louis used a stylus and a wooden writing board with paper. The hands must be moved from left to right along each line to read Braille.
When he was finished, Louis Braille took his apparatus to the Royal Institution for Blind Youth's director. Louis had to jot down what the director said as he read from a newspaper. He wrote on a wooden writing board with paper while using a stylus. With the raised dots he had made, he was able to read back all of the words to the director. The director found this to be impressive.
An intriguing aspect about Louis Braille is that he went on to modify his approach to music and mathematics. In 1829, he released the first book on Braille. "Method of Writing Words, Music, and Plain Songs utilizing Dots, for Use by the Blind and Arranged for Them" was the name of the procedure.
