Helen keller was born in 1880 and died in 1968, just a few weeks before her 88th birthday. When she was born, she could see and hear, but lost both abilities when she was 18 months old due to a illness her doctor called a brain fever and lost her ability to see, speak and hear. At the time she went blind and deaf, few people believed there was any hope that such a person would ever achieve anything significant in life. However, Helen proved that the deaf-blind can learn, graduate from college, write books, affect change in the world - whatever they want to accomplish.