Palau Louis Braille 200th Birthday $5 2009 Antique Finish Proof Silver Crown COA

Louis Braille was born on January 4, 1809. He lost his eyesight when he was three years old by accidentally poking himself in the eye with an awl, one of his father’s saddle-making tools. At age ten he was sent to Paris to study in the world’s first school for the blind. He invented the raised dot system of writing at age 16, but it wasn’t until thirty years later that his method of writing was introduced to French schools for the blind. He never lived to see his system achieve international fame because he died of tuberculosis in 1852.