We arrived once again, at the American School for the Deaf at 8:30 this morning to meet and interview Executive Director Dr. Harvey Corson. Since we were not able to catch him during our tour of the grounds yesterday, we wanted to be sure we had the opportunity to meet with him before leaving Connecticut.

During the video interview, Dr. Corson recounted the history of ASD, including the three times it had moved in Hartford before settling on its present campus. He also talked about the many firsts he had achieved throughout his 39 years in Deaf education. He was the first Deaf superintendent of both Louisiana School for the Deaf and Kentucky School for the Deaf, and the first Deaf executive director in ASD’s 187 year history. Corson even served as the first Deaf vice president of Gallaudet University, and is a proud beacon of what the Deaf person is capable of doing, in terms of education. After we enjoyed talking with Dr. Corson, we went to the headquarters of the National Theater of the Deaf, which was located right on the ASD campus.

We met with Paul Winters, three year director of NTD, and were given a tour of the NTD offices. Although the office was rather small, it was very vibrant with the history of NTD, with framed posters of the many, many performances NTD has given over the last 30-plus years adorning the walls. The space which NTD now occupies was formerly known as the Converse Communications Center, and carries with it a very important part of the Deaf community. The very first Relay Center was based in this building, and relay calls were taken by revolutionary operators for the first time here in 1974. Winters shared his joy that the offices were now based on ASD’s campuses because he feels that NTD and the school can feed off of each other, and they can grow and thrive in such a Deaf-friendly atmosphere. Paul Winters also answered some of the questions we had about NTD. One of the questions we asked was if they viewed the DeafWest Theater as their competition, since they both vie for grants from the Department of Education. He replied that he in no way views them as competitors, because “many of the people involved with DeafWest had their beginnings with NTD.” He hopes that both organizations thrives and succeeds. Winters asked that we share with the entire Deaf community that, “The National Theater of the Deaf is HERE and ALIVE!” He emphasizes that although they have been going through some difficult times, they have finally begun to rebound and hope to count on your support.

Once we had finished with touring the NTD office, we had the rest of the day to ourselves. Since we were in the New England area, famous for its beautiful golf courses, we just had to take this opportunity to go and play 18 holes of golf. We played at Rockledge Golf Club, which was in West Hartford just a mile away from the American School for the Deaf. Rockledge is a beautiful course with rolling hills and challenging par threes, and the weather certainly was a nice bonus to our day with 75-degrees of warmth.

Jed, Kevin, and I love to golf, and since Branic isn’t too crazy about the game, we needed one more person to round-out our foursome. We were joined by Frank Carter, who had recently moved to Hartford from Maryland. He is an independent contractor and his wife works as an Audiologist at ASD. We enjoyed getting to know him and watching him wipe the greens with our *ahem* putters. Carter is an excellent golfer, eagling one hole, and birding two or three others.

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