The Ontario School for the Deaf

Photo by Alan L Brown - May 21, 2004

Photo by Alan L Brown - July 8, 2007

Plaque Location

The County of Hastings
The City of Belleville
In front of the main building of the School for the Deaf on the north side of Dundas Street West just west of Palmer Road

Plaque Text

In 1869, at the urging of John B. McGann, a pioneer educator of the hearing impaired, the Ontario government sanctioned the establishment of the first provincial school for deaf children. A residential institution combining elementary school instruction with vocational training, the Ontario Institution for the Education of the Deaf and Dumb was officially opened in October 1870. Increasing enrolment during the following decades led to steady expansion and improvement of facilities. When curricula were revised and advanced academic instruction introduced during the tenure of Dr. Charles B. Coughlin (1906-28), the school gained wide recognition for its contributions to special education. Renamed the Ontario School for the Deaf in 1913, it became the Sir James Whitney School in 1974 in honour of Ontario's sixth prime minister.

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