of eyesight,
and of earning capacity as well.

Improper lighting and ventilating in factories, shops and stores, and
work requiring excessive eyestrain, contributes to a long list of
disabilities often resulting in total blindness. The passage, by our
last Legislature, of the Common Towel Bill, prohibiting the use of
roller towels anywhere in the state, has removed one of the most
flagrant causes of infection, and one to which very little attention was
paid by factory workers generally. I know one young man and two young
women whose total blindness is the result of infection from the use of a
roller towel.

I trust all these facts and figures may not prove wearisome, for it is
necessary to know them if you are to realize the extent of the work
being done here and elsewhere to prevent blindness and conserve vision.
I have not mentioned all the activities of the State Industrial Accident
Commission, or the National Council of Safety, but a visit to the Safety
Museum, 525 Market street, San Francisco, or to the Union League
Building, Los Angeles, will enlighten you further as to the progress of
the Safety First movement, and convince you of the wisdom and humanity
of it. Let us adopt prevention and conservation as household words; let
us do our share in spreading the gospel, and soon we shall have fewer
blind babies, fewer children sitting on the side lines, and fewer men
and women deprived of eyesight at the floodtide of life. This is another
of my dreams, and this one is already coming true. "Let there be light!"
was the first recorded utterance of the Most High God. "Let there be
light!" has been the watchword on the lips of human progress during all
the centuries that have gone, and they must be the battle-cry of
Progress during all the centuries that are to come. I am sure we shall
all be glad to do our share to preserve this light for our own and
future generations.

End of Project Gutenberg's Five Lectures on Blindness, by Kate M. Foley

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