Google doodle on Charles-Michel de L'Epée who made deaf to communicate well before 'deaf out loud'

Google is honoring Charles-Michel de L'Epée with a doodle on his 306th birthday.

Charles-Michel de L'Epée, the founder of the first public school for the deaf, was born on November 24, 1712, in Versailles and died December 23, 1789, in Paris. He was a French priest and one of the forerunners specialized in education for the deaf.

His father, an architect of the buildings of King Louis XIV, wanted his son to be his successor. After studying theology and law, Charles-Michel opted for the priesthood. During this era, French Catholics faced a reform activism called Jansenism which requires all priests to sign a condemnation of it before their ordination. The Archbishop of Paris invited Epee to give him his opinion on Jansenism which he, unwilling to take sides, didn't accept and thus was deprived of ordination. He then became a member of the bar and acquired a great reputation as a lawyer.

In 1736, he was offered priesthood and gave up his career to get ordained priest at Troyes.

Between 1760 and 1762, Epee befriended a cleric, Father Vanin, and through him met two twin sisters, both of them being deaf since birth. Vanin had been tutoring them, and when the fellow cleric died unexpectedly, Epee agreed to teach binoculars to them. He studied the signs by these girls. His house was transformed into a school open to all the deaf. He then had the idea to develop a two-handed alphabet with which the deaf can communicate.

At that time, a few educational opportunities were available for the deaf and primitive superstitions being still firmly entrenched in parts of Western Europe, the deaf were considered senseless and incapable of reason. Only in 1500, Girolamo Cardano, conduct a study that proved the deaf were capable of reason.

In his school, Epee had 19 disciples who later founded 17 schools for the deaf.

Google is honoring Charles-Michel de L'Epée with a doodle on his 306^th birthday!