From Asylum to School
In the early 1800s, some wealthy families in Hartford, Connecticut, pooled their resources to help found churches and other institutions for the public good. Among those institutions was the first permanent school for deaf children, the Connecticut Asylum for the Education and Instruction of Deaf and Dumb persons. In the language of the day, asylum meant a safe place, and dumb referred to individuals who did not speak with understandable speech. Because of changing word associations, asylum eventually gave way to institution, then school. Today the "Connecticut Asylum" is named the American School for the Deaf.