Chorded keyboard (a writing system for the blind) uses either 6 or 8 tactile 'points' from which all letters and numbers are formed. When Louis Braille invented it, it was produced with a needle holing successively all needed points in a cardboard sheet. In 1892, Frank Haven Hall, superintendent of the Illinois Institute for the Education of the Blind, created the Hall Braille Writer, which was like a typewriter with 6 keys, one for each dot in a braille cell. The Perkins Brailler, first manufactured in 1951, uses a 6-key chord keyboard (plus a spacebar) to produce braille output, and has been
Museum of the American Printing House for the Blind are meant to be touched. A reader rail follows the entire museum with braille labels, audio devices, and tactile illustrations in front of each exhibit. Visitors will see original Talking Book recording and playback equipment, long canes and dog guide harness, original stereotype printing plates and equipment, a comprehensive collection of historic braillewriters, and many historic books printed in various tactile writing systems. These include "An Essay on the Education of the Blind" printed 1786 in the first raised letters for blind people; "The Gospel According to St. Mark" printed 1834 in raised Roman letters; John Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress" printed