A guidance device for the blind
DOI: 10.1063/1.3061459
In 1943 the Signal Corps began the development of a travel aid which was to be used to help the blinded of World War II in their rehabilitation program. The scope of the problem soon developed to include all blind people, civilians as well as veterans. The research on a suitable guidance device went through several stages and finally reached the point where RCA was contracted by the Signal Corps to manufacture 25 prototypes for test and evaluation. Subsequently, a contract was entered into between the Veterans Administration Research Division and Haverford College for the express purpose of giving the Signal Corps Sensory Aid a realistic series of field tests. Before describing the results of these tests let us say a few words about the instrument itself.
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References
1. Preliminary tests were made at the Valley Forge Army Hospital under the supervision of Dr. R. E. Hoover and at the Haskins Laboratory in New York under the direction of Dr. Franklin Cooper.
2. Cooper Franklin. “Guidance Devices for the Blind”. Physics Today, III:7:6. July 1950.
3. For a technical discussion of the instrument, see Electronics, March 1946, page 116 (McGraw‐Hill).
4. Clifford M. Witcher, staff member, Research Laboratory of Electronics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is currently eneaced in developing a satisfactory curb locator.
5. It is not known how this would be done. It is included to encoura‐«age thought on the subject.
More about the authors
T. A. Benham, Haverford College.
