The Halifax School for the Deaf (The Deaf and Dumb Institution, Halifax) was an institution in
Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, which opened on 4 August 1856.[1] It was the first school of the deaf in
Atlantic Canada. (The
Halifax School for the Blind was opened on Morris Street in 1871.) There was later a dispute over who the true founder was, William Gray (1806-1881), a deaf Scottish immigrant who was the first teacher in the back room of a house in Argyle Street, or George Tait (1828-1904), another deaf Scot, who claimed to have been the driving force behind the establishment of the school.[2] Gray was sacked in 1870 for being intoxicated and for threatening pupils with violence.[3]
The first principal of the school was
James Scott Hutton, who remained with the school 34 years.[4]William Cunard (son of Sir
Samuel Cunard) eventually built a school, which was completed in 1896 and was attended by 90 students.
Following the
Halifax Explosion, the main building was temporarily closed for repairs. Half of the students attended classes on the campus of
Acadia College in
Wolfville, while others remained without education until the classes were relocated back to Halifax.[5]
J. Scott Hutton, "Deaf-Mute Education in the British Maritime Provinces," American Annals of the Deaf, Volume 14 (Raleigh, N. C.: Press of the Institution for the Deaf and Dumb and the Blind), pg 65-82.