Welthy Honsinger Fisher, The ‘First Lady of

WELTHY HONSINGER FISHER, THE ‘FIRST LADY OF LITERACY’

It may sound strange to acknowledge the fact that a woman from USA campaigned vigorously for the promotion of literacy in India. But it was a reality and that lady is none other than Welthy Fisher. At the time of independence out of 435 millions of Indian population about 320 million was illiterate. The Government of India realised that building up modern India is possible only by eradicating illiteracy. The Government wanted to carry on its literacy mission with adult education. To implement its programme the Government of India invited Mr. Frank Christian Laubach, Literacy Pioneer to help in preparing materials and simple teaching techniques. He in turn sought the help of Welthy Fisher for instructing the first group of trainees using new methods and materials prepared by him. In 1953 Welthy Fisher broke away from Laubach and founded Literacy House at Allahabad. She developed secular methods to encourage functional literacy by linking it with agriculture and industrial development. Thus she became not only ‘India’s Lamp of Learning’ but is called world’s First Lady of Literacy.

Life of Welthy Fisher shows that neither age, nor nationality nor race are barriers to work for the eradication of illiteracy in the world. Some glimpses of her journey will definitely inspire many of us.

Welthy Fisher was born on 18th September, 1879 at Rome in New York. Her maiden name was Welthy Honsinger. Her father was the owner of an iron foundry. She graduated from Syracuse University. She also studied music in New York and Paris. Her original plan was to make a career in opera. In that connection she attended a Methodist meeting. That changed her thinking as well as the entire course of her life. At the age of 21 she took up teaching. Her first assignment as a teacher was in a one room school called ‘Rose bud college’ in Havertshaw, New York. The school had only 15 students. In that school she had the experience of how racist prejudices affect students. One Negro boy ran away from the school fearing that he would be punished for the misdeed of a white student. Welthy Honsinger brought him to the school and defended him.

After working for six years in New York she was drawn to overseas service and posted in China. Inspite of resistance from home she went to China in 1906 as Headmistress of the school ‘Bao Lin’, a methodist school for young Chinese women in Nanching. She learnt Mandarin and adopted Chinese customs. She modernised the school and introduced science and music in higher classes inspite of political pressure. She was even called a communist, but she did not yield. She delivered lectures on women’s topics and international friendship. She supported Chinese industrial cooperatives. Unfortunately the out break of fire in the shool lead to its closure. She returned to USA with the objective of collecting funds for rebuilding the school. Within a span of fifteen months through her lectures she raised enough money and rebuilt the school and returned to China. But when USA entered World War I she left China and became YWCA worker.

During her fund raising campaigns she met Dr. Fredearich Bohn Fisher, methodist Bishop of India and Burma and married him in 1924 on June 24th. During their stay in India they came in contact with Rabindranath Tagore, Gandhiji and Nehru. After her husband’s death in 1938 she went to USA. She tried to channelise her talent and energy in a new way. She toured extensively in USA and wrote books on international understanding. During 1940’s she spent ‘Semesters’ studying the educational systems of Mexico, Peru, Bolivia, Brazil, India and Middle East. When she visited India in 1947 Gandhiji asked her personally to return to India permanetly and continue her work in the field of education since the only way to eradicate poverty is through literacy. He asked her “when you come go to villages and help them. India is the village”. This happened just a few days before his death. At that time she said “Illiteracy is a real tragedy for a modern man. As a nation becomes democratic and industrial, there is no time for the wise as they are handed down in the village square. Now a man who cannot read is cut off from participation in choosing his own government, in choosing his leaders. He can’t progress or improve himself because he can’t read directions or handle the working of the machines. In this new India men and women needed to read as never before.” Literacy training was key strategy to eradicate poverty. She adored Gandhiji and was of the opinion that “There was no one with whom I could compare him except Christ himself.”

She finally came to India in 1952 to work with Laubach. (USA) Initially she worked with the teaching group. Their first job was to produce charts of Hindi language. Choosing from Laubach’s 2000 common household words and from flip books made by new literates, a word list used by British Government Institutes, the group developed their own vocabulary. Some members fanned out to villages to study what the villagers wanted to learn most about. They discovered that agriculture, religion and movies were the topics of interest to the villagers. Thus it was realised that ‘Function Literacy’ programme should aim not only to read, write and arithmetic but to prepare them to understand and face problems and responsibilities of living.

Allahabad Agricultural Institute requested her to help in an experiment aimed at introducing child care, sanitation, modern farming in 550000 villages in India. She designed a trunk which could hold 50 books and can be carried out on a bicycle. Along with 43 graduates of the university she made a literacy kit including blackboard, chalk, slates, simple readers and kerosene lamp. In 1953 she founded Saksharata Niketan, i.e., Literacy House, a small non formal school that combined literacy with vocational training. Initially her team faced stiff opposition from illiterate villagers. But after the persistent efforts of the team some started enjoying reading and writing. This acted as a philip to draw other villagers into the programme.

In 1956 she moved her head quarters to Lucknow and called it ‘Literacy village’ Study groups from Iran, Iraq, Nepal, Phillippines, Afganisthan, Mali came to Literacy village to study the methods of teaching. She trained four well educated Tibetons who set up school for refugees. She also trained puppeteers to tell stories to educate people about vocations, diseases and explain how money lenders cheated the illiterates. For twenty years she devoted her entire life for the welfare of Indian villagers. In 1973 she handed over the management of the institute to Indian Literacy Board and went to USA.

After the establishment of Literacy House in India she realised that similar programmes are needed throughout the world. This lead to the setting up of world Literacy of Canada in Toranto in 1955 and ‘World Education’ in New York, both non-profit organisations. In 1955 she was invited by Dr. Frank Baubach, founder of ‘each one teach one’ adult literacy teaching method, to share her experiences in India with a small group of Canadians at camps Farthest out meeting. Inspired by her speech the group formed the World Literacy of Canada. World Literacy of Canada’s main goal at the time of its creation was to support the literacy initiatives in India by involving in education and community development programmes. Later on from 1955 it started supporting the literacy programmes in Canada, Africa, Asia, Latin America and Caribbean countries. It addressed mainly adult literacy programmes, aimed at women. Dr Welthy Fisher served as honorary President till 1978. Between 1951 and 1972 she was deeply involved with the activities of ‘World Education’ in providing literacy training throughout the world. Due to her efforts World Education was built with necessary vision and strength to carry out its work into 21st Century to reach more men, women and girls.

In 1964 Dr. Welthy Fisher was awarded the prestigious Magsaysay Award for her work in promoting literacy. She spent the entire prize money of $10000 on setting up a farmers, institute where men were taught farming, reading, writing and simple arithmetic.

Dr. Durgabai Deshmukh, inspired by the work of Welthy Fisher wanted to set up Literacy House in Hyderabad. She approached Welthy Fisher and Miss Sally Swenson of World Literacy of Canada. They helped her in translating her idea into reality. On 14th January, 1971 Welthy Fisher laid the foundation stone for the Literacy House of Andhra Mahila Sabha at Hyderabad. With the initial donation of Rs. 45000 from Welthy Fisher and Miss Sally, Literacy House, Andhra Mahila Sabha conducted workshops. The entire cost of construction of Literacy House of Andhra Mahila Sabha building with equipment to the extent of Rs. 4.5 lakhs was donated by World Literacy of Canada. In addition they contributed to the purchase of five jeeps to be used for conveyance of the supervisory staff for monitoring the implementation of the literacy programmes. All this was possible due to Welthy Fisher.

Welthy Fisher was a woman of action. She was a great fund raiser. She was ready at a moments notice to speak, campaign, and travel to raise money for the people. Though she lived a simple living and was dedicated to the notion of Christian charity she never gave up her personal pleasures and family life. In the words of Mrs. Indira Gandhi, the late prime Minister of India “Mrs Fisher lived life to the hilt.”

It is amazing that a woman at the age of 72 took up her life time mission of ‘Literacy for all” and successfully implemented it during her life time. Her success lies in her ability to become a part of the people though she was not well versed in their language, or customs. No wonder villagers considered her as their benefactor. She supported the integrated activities of literacy, vocational training and youth activity programmes. She taught the NSS girls the art of communication, ‘mix freely and get totally involved with the target population in all their social activities so that the subject of literacy may not look dull or too formidable to village women.”

In 1978 she visited Peking (China) as the oldest foreign guest of Chinese government. She visited India in 1973 and 1977. Her last visit to India was in 1980. She breathed her last in Southburry, Connecticut on December, 1980, at the age of 101 years.

She received many awards. Besides Magsaysay Award, Nehru Literacy Award, UNESCO Literacy prize, US Government special Award on International Literacy Day in 1978 were amongst these awards. The Government of India honoured her with the release of Welthy Honsinger Fisher stamp in March 1980. Though physically she is no more her motto drawn from Chinese proverb “It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness” inspires even today the workers involved in the promotion of literacy throughout the world.