Abraham Nemeth, who has died aged 94, devised the Nemeth Braille Code for Mathematics and Science Notation, thus allowing blind students across America to read, write and understand advanced mathematical equations.
Blind from the age of six weeks old, Nemeth began taking night classes in mathematics at Brooklyn College in the early 1940s . In 1946, having mastered all the undergraduate courses on offer, he volunteered to teach extra sessions on calculus to students who had been forced to leave their studies for wartime service and now wished to catch up. To avoid any ambiguity, teacher and pupils followed a simple oral code of Nemeth’s own devising. Hence, (A+B)/C = X would be spoken aloud as “(start frac) A plus B over C (end frac) equals X”. Later, Nemeth would develop this oral method into a coherent teaching protocol, which he christened “Mathspeak”.
At that time, the primary Braille for mathematical equations in the United States was the Taylor Code, developed by the English mathematician Henry Martyn Taylor in 1917. Nemeth, however, found the Taylor Code inadequate for the rigours of calculus. He therefore began developing a personal notation, analogous to his system for dictating problems aloud. This meant that a sighted transcriber familiar with the code would not need any knowledge of mathematics in order to render a problem correctly.
Following a ruling in 1952 by the American Joint Uniform Braille Committee – an ancestor of today’s Braille Authority of North America (BANA) – Nemeth Code became accepted as a standard way of representing mathematical and scientific expressions. Revised four times, it was later officially adopted by Canada, and by several South-East Asian countries.
More recently the English-speaking blind community has attempted to unite the various Braille systems for the various disciplines, resulting in a Unified English Braille (UEB). The project began with a memo from Nemeth and Dr Tim Cranmer to BANA in 1991, expressing concern over the “disarray” of the codes then in use . The International Council on English Braille was established that May. As UEB began to take shape, however, Nemeth grew disillusioned, believing that it would only make mathematical notation more complicated. In order to write the equation 4a + 3b, for example, it was necessary to put a # indicating the presence of a number before the 4, then a letter sign before the a, and so on . He responded with a revised code of his own, the Nemeth Uniform Braille System (NUBS), but it did not find favour with national committees.
On October 21 2011 the UK Association for Accessible Formats recognised UEB as an official Braille system for Britain. The decision was echoed in the United States on November 2 2012, but with one key difference: the Nemeth Code would remain standard for the study of science and mathematics.
The son of immigrant Hungarian Jews, Abraham Nemeth was born in Manhattan, New York City, on October 16 1918. The city’s grid plan meant that numbers were integral to his landscape from an early age, and his family encouraged him to orientate himself by touching the letters stamped on fire hydrants and postboxes.
The Nemeth Code for Braille
Nemeth was educated at the New York Jewish Guild for the Blind in Yonkers. Since there was then no Hebrew Braille, he learnt Biblical and Talmudic lore by listening to his grandfather read aloud.
After graduation he was eager to pursue his interest in mathematics, but soon met with resistance from his guidance counsellors . He therefore elected to read Psychology, but kept up his mathematical studies wherever the course allowed, graduating with a BA in Psychology from Brooklyn College in 1940, and an MA from Columbia University in 1942.
There was then an acute shortage of jobs for skilled workers, and Nemeth scraped through his studies hemming pillowcases and loading trucks at an agency for the blind. He married and moved into an apartment with his wife Florence, who was legally blind herself. She encouraged him to pursue mathematics and he returned to Brooklyn. From 1955 he was a professor of theoretical mathematics at the University of Detroit.
Following retirement in 1985 Nemeth worked as a Braille proofreader for Hebrew and Biblical texts, and in 2006 finished composing the English Braille for a Hebrew-English version of a bestselling siddur, or prayer book. That same year he received the Louis Braille Award from the International Braille Research Center in recognition of his lifetime’s work.
A talented pianist, he was a fine speaker and an active member of the National Federation of the Blind.
Abraham Nemeth’s first wife, the former Florence Weissman, died in 1970. His second wife, Edna, whom he married in 1971, predeceased him in 2000.
Abraham Nemeth, born October 16 1918, died October 2 2013