This special school in Raleigh, North Carolina, has been changing lives for visually impaired children since 1845.
by Katherine Snow Smith | photography by S.P. Murray

Eight-year-old Allison Bolivar seems reluctant to release her father’s hand. It’s time to line up for the opening ceremonies of the annual Braille Challenge at the Governor Morehead School in Raleigh, which takes place in February, and she’s a little nervous.

Bolivar is one of 21 children from across the state competing in a day of proofreading, spelling, reading comprehension and deciphering charts. Bolivar came from Robeson County with her parents just for the event, like eight other families who traveled across the state. The other 12 competitors live on campus.

Since 1845, children have been letting go of a parent’s hand to venture into an unknown world at this school for the visually impaired, which was first called the North Carolina Institution of the Deaf and Dumb and the Blind. The name was changed to honor Gov. John Motley Morehead in 1964. The school currently instructs 45 students and boards 42. The children they serve range in age from 5 to 21 and hail from as far west as Newton and as far east as Edenton. Students never pay to attend the school, which is supported largely by private donations and some state funding.

The Ashe Avenue campus, 2 miles from Pullen Park, is dotted with red brick buildings centered around a small garden with a bronze bust of Helen Keller, a quote from whom is etched in both Braille and traditional letters: “When one door of happiness closes, another one opens.”

A door of happiness opened wide at the school for one of its most famous alumnus, six-time Grammy winner Ronnie Milsap. According to Milsap’s 1977 biography, Almost Like a Song, when he was born blind in the mountain town of Robbinsville, his mother thought it was a punishment from God and wanted nothing to do with him. His grandparents raised him until he moved, at age 5, to this school, where his musical talent budded. Another alumnus, North Carolina musical legend Arthel Lane “Doc” Watson, credited the school for exposing him to classical and jazz music and for nurturing talent his family already seeded, according to the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame.  

Bolivar also has an inclination for music and is learning to play the guitar at church. Her confidence isn’t as strong 95 miles away from her hometown of Shannon, population 246. But when MC Susan Patterson announces Bolivar’s name, the girl is the first to make her way beneath the “Tunnel of Canes,” with a shy smile that turns up ever so slightly toward her thick, dark bangs. Akin to a military arch of swords, the ceremonial tunnel is formed by almost 20 GMS teachers and employees from the State Library of North Carolina’s accessible services division.

“Scholars, best of luck to you,” says GMS principal Matthew Mescall after all students are introduced. “I hope you enjoy the competition, but more importantly, I hope you enjoy each other’s company.” Fifty competitors with highest scores from around the country will go on to compete in the Braille Challenge Finals in Los Angeles this summer, including one Raleigh teenager, Reese Blum.

“You get to make a lot of new friends,” Blum says as she leaves the Braille Challenge and begins climbing a tree on the school’s campus. “I made a really good friend there who’s not from here. I’m still going to go to support her and she’s going to go to support me even if one of us doesn’t make it as a finalist.”

Hopes of making friends eased the pain when Susan Patterson left her Robeson County home at age 10 in 1966 to live at the Raleigh school. Because she was Black, she attended Governor Morehead’s school for African Americans on Garner Road, 5 miles south of the Capitol Building. North Carolina was the first state in the nation to start a school for visually impaired Black children in 1869, after the Civil War, but wouldn’t fully integrate it until 1977.

“Being a child, I really was kind of excited,” Patterson says. “I thought to myself: more friends!” She wasn’t completely blind, but Patterson didn’t start attending school in Lumberton until she was 8 and was behind her grade level when she arrived in Raleigh. The many large-print books at the Governor Morehead School, smaller classes and specialized teachers opened a whole new door. “I caught up fast. In fact, I skipped some grades,” she says. Patterson was among the first Black students to integrate the school’s main campus on Ashe Avenue in 1967.

“I remember wondering why these people didn’t say anything to us or acknowledge us,” Patterson recalls of the white students on campus. “But then as I got older, I thought, well, we didn’t really do anything to acknowledge them. I guess it took some getting used to, sharing your school with people you don’t know. After it all settled down, some of us became the best of friends with each other.”

Patterson is a key organizer for annual Governor Morehead School reunions, which often include a tour of the old Garner Road school that now houses the State Bureau of Investigation. She went on to earn her associate’s degree in early childhood education at Central Piedmont Community College in Charlotte and worked as a house parent at the Governor Morehead School for 28 years until she retired 12 years ago.

She’s seen many changes at the school. One of the best, she thinks, is that it now sends four buses across the state every weekend to transport students home and back. For many decades, most children stayed on campus throughout the school year, even during holidays, because their parents couldn’t afford a bus ticket home.

“I can remember getting that bus ticket to Lumberton for $3.30 about once a month so I could go home,” she says. “I could call my parents, too, but some people didn’t even have phones at home so they didn’t talk to their family that whole year.”

It was hard, but the independence students gained and are still gaining at Governor Morehead School is as important as their academics, Patterson says. “I stress to sighted people when you’re talking about blind people, concentrate on our accomplishments, not our limitations,” she says.  

This article originally appeared in the November 2024 issue of WALTER magazine.