A Hutchinson native created his first tactile braille U.S. flag about 16 years ago and has since installed the unique bronze plaque in a couple of hundred locations around the U.S, including the Arlington National Cemetery and World Trade Center monument, as well as in several foreign countries.
But on Sunday, Randolph Cabral, founder and president of the Kansas Braille Transcription Institute, will unveil the installation of one of the flags in Hutchinson — where it was first inspired.
The handicap-accessible monument in Avenue A Park will be uncovered during a public 2 p.m. ceremony attended by local dignitaries, veteran organization representatives and Cabral family members.
Cabral’s father, Jesus Cabral, who also grew up in Hutchinson and returned here after serving in the U.S. Army Air Force during World War II, started going blind from glaucoma about 10 years before his death in 1998, Randolph Cabral said.
Because their father, an avid reader, could no longer read, his sons began researching assistive technology for the blind, with Randolph Cabral eventually making assisting the blind his life’s work.
Besides reading, another activity their father loved, Cabral said, was displaying the American flag outside his home on national holidays. It was a few years after his father died that Cabral’s mother noted he had been unable to enjoy the experience of displaying his flag after he lost his sight, so she suggested creating something that allowed those who loved the flag like his father to continue to do so.
“We learned there’s a huge population of blinded veterans,” said Cabral, who now lives and works in Wichita, though his mother still lives on Avenue A. “Even today, there is in excess of 1 million war-blinded and visually impaired veterans, but very little technology is made accessible to them.”
How the braille flag works. The 12 ½-by-13 ½-inch, quarter-inch thick bronze plaque contains an American flag with the stars and what would be white stripes elevated. Braille lettering on the right side of each stripe denotes its color.
Braille is a system of raised dots used by blind people to read and write. Invented in 1824 by the Frenchman Louis Braille, a braille “cell” is made up of six dots, like a domino, with each letter using a different pattern of which are raised.
The Pledge of Allegiance is inscribed in regular writing across the white stripes and spelled out in braille on the red ones. In one corner of the monument is a key, reiterating in braille that the white stripes and five-pointed stars are raised, Cabral said.
When Congressman Todd Tiahrt visited the braille transcription institute while campaigning in 2007, Cabral said, he was shown the flag and suggested one be placed in the Arlington National Cemetery. That led to legislation designating the monument as the official tactile U.S. flag and its installation in the cemetery in February 2008.
The flags are now at about 200 locations in the U.S. “It’s a replica of the national monument at Arlington National Cemetery,” Cabral said of the new Hutchinson installation. “It will be on a stone placed by the City of Hutchinson Park Department.”
Three of the stones the plaque is attached to were delivered together to Hutchinson, so the Kansas Braille Transcription Institute (KBTI) is contemplating installing the monuments at a couple of other locations as well, including at the Veteran’s Memorial in South Hutchinson and VFW in Hutchinson.
Cabral has also volunteered to put one in front of the Hutchinson Public Library, which he said has the only dedicated braille library in the state. Run by Hannah Wallace, it’s on the second floor and has more than 100 volumes.
In Kansas, the flags currently are displayed in Topeka, at five locations in Wichita and four sites in Emporia, where Veterans Day was first organized and celebrated in 1953.
KBTI has partnered with veteran and scouting organizations around the country to place these flags. They also sent one to the Queen of England, Cabral said, along with a braille United Kingdom flag.
Cabral began learning braille in 1995 and became a certified braillist a year later. He founded the non-profit braille institute in Wichita in 2000 to address a lack of braille material for students and provide transcription services for the general public.
KBTI began operating as both a training and production facility by mid-2000, offering formatted refreshable braille transcription and Braille Writer repair, according to its website.
“We teach braille throughout the U.S. virtually,” Cabral said. “We helped develop the program that allows braille to be taught via the internet… Now it’s used all over the world. And as people graduate, we employ them.”
The company has 36 sighted certified transcribers and blind proofreaders, and “a huge number of people who work independently.”
It has contracts to create materials for schools and colleges throughout the country and also has a contract with the Boy Scouts of America to produce its literature in braille, as well as two major Catholic publishers, Cabral said.
“We do hymnals for a Catholic publisher,” he said. “It’s been going now for 23 years.”
Cabral said some of his father’s visual impairment was believed to be tied to his military service — he fought in both Europe and the South Pacific during the war — and that a lot of veterans suffer damage to their eyes from the concussion of explosives, which can damage the retina.
That impairment included injury to those firing big guns on ships, for example, he said, and improvised explosives (IEDs) in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“More servicemen and women have sustained visual impairment and blindness from Iraq and Afghanistan than in any war since the Civil War,” he said. “The damage can occur from a great distance away.”
