COLLEGE OF OSTEOPATHIC PHYSICIANS AND SURGEONS LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA STAMMERING ITS CAUSE AND CURE BENJAMIN N. BOGUE STAMMERING ITS CAUSE AND CURE BY BENJAMIN NATHANIEL BOGUE A Chronic Stammerer for Almost Twenty Years; Originator of the Bogue Unit Method of Eestoring Perfect Speech; Founder of the Bogue Institute for Stammerers and Editor of the "Emancipator," a magazine devoted to the Interests of Perfect Speech INDIANAPOLIS BENJAMIN NATHANIEL BOGTJJU Printed in the United States of America Copyright 1919 by Benjamin Nathaniel Bogue Copyright 1920 by Benjamin Nathaniel Bogue Copyright 1922 by Benjamin Nathaniel Bogue First Printing, November, 1919 Second Printing, October, 1920 Third Printing, September, 1922 Fourth Printing, September, 1924 Fifth Printing, March, 1926 Sixth Printing, April, 1927 Seventh Printing, September, 1929 HAMMOND PRESS W. A CONKCY COMPANY CHICAGO TO MY MOTHER That wonderful woman whose unflag- ging courage held me to a task that I never could have completed alone and who when all others failed, stood by me, encouraged me and pointed out the heights where lay success this volume is dedicated CONTENTS Preface 11 PAET I MY LIFE AS A STAMMEEBE I Starting Life Under a Handicap 15 II My First Attempt to Be Cured 19 m My Search Continues 27 IV A Stammerer Hunts a Job 36 V Further Futile Attempts to Be Cured 40 VI I Eefnse to Be Discouraged 48 VH The Benefit of Many Failures 51 VIII Beginning Where Others Had Left Off .... 57 PAET II STAMMEEING AND STUTTEEING The Causes, Peculiarities, Tendencies and Effects I Speech Disorders Defined 62 II The Causes of Stuttering and Stammering ... 72 III The Peculiarities of Stuttering and Stammering . 90 IV The Intermittent Tendency 97 V The Progressive Tendency 102 VI Can Stammering and Stuttering Be Outgrown? . . 108 VH The Effect on the Mind 113 Vin The Effect on the Body 117 IX Defective Speech in Children (1) The Pre-Speaking Period 120 X Defective Speech in Children (2) The Formative Period 128 21955 10 STAMMERING 21 Defective Speech in Children (3) The Speech-Setting Period 136 YTT The Speech Disorders of Youth 144 Alii Where Does Stammering Lead? 151 PAET m THE CUBE OF STAMMEEING AND STUTTEEING I Can Stammering Eeally Be Cured! 160 H . Cases That "Cure Themselves" 164 m Cases That Cannot Be Cured 167 IV Can Stammering Be Cured by Mail? 177 V The Importance of Expert Diagnosis 181 VI The Secret of Curing Stuttering and Stammering . 186 VIE The Bogue Unit Method Described 190 Vm Some Cases I Have Met 208 PART IV SETTING THE TONGUE FEEE I The Joy of Perfect Speech 230 11 How to Determine Whether You Can Be Cured . . 233 in The Bogue Guarantee and What It Means .... 236 IV The Cure Is Permanent 239 V A Priceless Gift An Everlasting Investment . . . 243 VI The Home of Perfect Speech 246 Vn My Mother and The Home Life at the Institute . . 255 V3H A Heart-to-Heart Talk with Parents 264 IX The Dangers of Delay 269 PREFACE CONSIDERABLY more than a third of a century has elapsed since I purchased my first book on stammering. I still have that quaint little book made up in its typically English style with small pages, small type and yellow paper back the work of an English author whose ob- tuse and half-baked theories certainly lent no clarity to the stammerer's understanding of his trouble. Since that first purchase my library of books on stammering has grown until it is per- haps the largest individual collection in the world. I have read these books many of them several times, pondered over the obscurities in some, smiled at the absurdities in others and benefited by the truths in a few. Yet, with all their profound explanations of theories and their verbose defense of hopelessly unscientific meth- ods, the stammerer would be disappointed in- deed, should he attempt to find in the entire collection a practical and understandable discus- sion of his trouble. This insufficiency of existing books on stam- 12 STAMMERING mering has encouraged me to bring out the pres- ent volume. It is needed. I know this because I spent almost twenty years of my life in a well- nigh futile search for the very knowledge herein revealed. I haunted the libraries, was a familiar figure in book stores and a frequent visitor to the second-hand dealer. Yet these efforts brought me comparatively little not one-tenth the infor- mation that this book contains. Perhaps it is but a colossal conceit that prompts me to offer this volume to those who stutter and stammer as I did. Yet, I cannot but believe that almost twenty years' personal expe- rience as a stammerer plus more than twenty- eight years' experience in curing speech disorders has supplied me with an intensely practical, val- uable and worth-while knowledge on which to base this book. After having stammered for twenty years you have pretty well run the whole gamut of mockery, humiliation and failure. You understand the stammerer's feelings, his mental processes and his peculiarities. And when you add to this more than a quarter ITS CAUSE AND CUBE 13 of a century, every waking hour of which has been spent in alleviating the stammerer's diffi- culty and successfully, too you have a ground- work of first-hand information that tends toward facts instead of fiction and toward practice instead of theory. These are my qualifications. I have spent a life-time in studying stammer- ing, stuttering and kindred speech defects. I have written this book out of the fullness of that experience I might almost say out of my daily work. I have made no attempt at literary style or rhetorical excellence and while the work may be homely in expression the information it con- tains is definite and positive and what is more important it is authoritative. I hope the reader will find the book useful yes, and helpful. I hope he will find in it the way to Freedom of Speech his birthright and the birthright of every man. BENJAMIN NATHANIEL BOGUE Indianapolis September, 1929 STAMMERING Its Cause and Cure CHAPTER I STARTING LIFE UNDER A HANDICAP 1WAS laughed at for nearly twenty years because I stammered. I found school a bur- den, college a practical impossibility and life a misery because of my affliction. I was born in Wabash county, Indiana, and as far back as I can remember, there was never a time when I did not stammer or stutter. So far as I know, the halting utterance came with the first word I spoke and for almost twenty years this difficulty continued to dog me relentlessly. When six years of age, I went to the little school house down the road, little realizing what I was to go through with there before I left. 16 STAMMEEING Previous to the time I entered school, those around me were my family, my relatives and my friends people who were very kind and con- siderate, who never spoke of my difficulty in my presence, and certainly never laughed at me. At school, it was quite another matter. It was fun for the other boys to hear me speak and it was common pastime with them to get me to talk whenever possible. They would jibe and jeer and then ask, "What did you say? Why don't you learn to talk English?" Their best enter- tainment was to tease and mock me until I be- came angry, taunt me when I did, and ridicule me at every turn. It was not only in the school yard and going to and from school that I suffered but also in class. When I got up to recite, what a spectacle I made, hesitating over every other word, stum- bling along, gasping for breath, waiting while speech returned to me. And how they laughed at me for then I was helpless to defend my- self. True, my teachers tried to be kind to me, but that did not make me talk normally like other children, nor did it always prevent the others from laughing at me. The reader can imagine my state of mind dur- ITS CAUSE AND CURE 17 ing these school days. I fairly hated even to start to school in the morning not because I dis- liked to go to school, but because I was sure to meet some of my taunting comrades, sure to be humiliated and laughed at because I stammered. And having reached the school room I had to face the prospect of failing every time I stood up on my feet and tried to recite. There were four things I looked forward to with positive dread the trip to school, the recita- tions in class, recess in the school yard and the trip home again. It makes me shudder even now to think of those days the dread with which I left that home of mine every school day morn- ing, the nervous strain, the torment and torture, and the constant fear of failure which never left me. Imagine my thoughts as I left parents and friends to face the ribald laughter of those who did not understand. I asked myself: "Well, what new disgrace today? Whom will I meet this morning? What will the teacher say when I stumble? How shall I get through recess? What is the easiest way home? These and a hundred other questions, born of nervousness and fear, I asked myself morning after morning. And day after day, as the hours 18 STAMMERING dragged by, I would wonder, "Will this day never end? Will I never get out of this?" Such was my life in school. And such is the daily life of thousands of boys and hundreds of girls a life of dread, of constant fear, of endless worry and unceasing nervousness. But, as I look back at the boys and girls who helped to make life miserable for me in school, I feel for them only kindness. I bear no malice. They did no more than their fathers and mothers, many of them, would have done. They little realized what they were doing. They had no intention to do me personal injury, though there is no question in my mind but that they made my trouble worse. They did not know how terribly they were punishing me. They saw in my afflic- tion only fun, while I saw in it only misery. CHAPTER II MY FIEST ATTEMPT TO BE CUBED 1CAN remember very clearly the positive fear which always accompanied a visit to our friends or neighbors, or the advent of visitors at my home. Many a time I did not have what I desired to eat because I was afraid to ask for it. When I did ask, every eye was turned on me, and the looks of the strangers, with now and then a half -suppressed smile, worked me up to a nervous state that was almost hysterical, causing me to stutter worse than at any other time. At one time I do not remember what the occasion was a number of people had come to visit us. A large table had been set and loaded with good things. We sat down, the many dishes were passed around the table, as was the custom at our home, and I said not a word. But before long the first helping was gone a hungry boy soon cleans his plate and I was about to ask for more when I bethought myself. "Please pass " I could never do it "p" was one of the hard sounds for me. "Please pass " No, I couldn't 20 STAMMERING do it. So busying myself with the things that were near at hand and helping myself to those things which came my way, I made out the meal hut I got up from the table hungry and with a deeper consciousness of the awfulness of my affliction. Slowly it began to dawn on me that as long as I stammered I was doomed to do with- out much of the world's goods. I began to see that although I might for a time sit at the World's Table of Good Things in Life I could hope to have little save that which someone passed on to me gratuitously. As long as I was at home with my parents, life went along fairly well. They understood my difficulty, they sympathized with me, and they looked at my trouble in the same light as myself as an affliction much to be regretted. At home I was not required to do anything which would embarrass me or cause me to become highly excited because of my straining to talk, but on the other hand I was permitted to do things which I could do well, without talking to any one. The time was coming, however, when it would be "Sink or Swim" for me, since it would not be ITS CAUSE AND CUBE 21 many years until a sense of duty, if nothing else, would send me out to make my own way. This time comes to all boys. It was soon to be my task to face the world to make a living for myself. And this was a thing which, strangely enough for a boy of my age, I began to think about. I had some experience in meeting people and in trying to transact some of the minor busi- ness connected with our farm and I found out that I had no chance along that line as long as I stammered. And yet it seemed as if I was to be compelled to continue to stammer the rest of my life, for my condition was getting worse every day. This was very clear to me and very plain to my parents. They were anxious to do something for me and do it quickly, so they called in a skilled physician. They told him about my trouble. He gave me a cursory examination and decided that my stuttering was caused by nervousness, and gave me some very distasteful medicine, which I was compelled to take three times a day. This medicine did me no good. I took it for five years, but there was no progress made toward curing my stuttering. The reason was simple. Stutter- 22 STAMMEEING ing cannot be cured by bitter medicine. The physician was using the wrong method. He was treating the effect and not the cause. He was of the opinion that it was the nervousness that caused my stuttering, whereas the fact of the matter was, it was my stuttering that caused the nervousness. I do not blame this physician in the least be- cause of his failure, for he was not an expert on the subject of speech defects. While he was a medical man of known ability, he had not made a study of speech disorders and knew practically nothing about either the cause or cure of stam- mering or stuttering. Even today, prominent medical men will tell you that their profession has given little or no attention to defects of speech and take little interest in such cases. Some time later, after the physician had failed to benefit me, a traveling medicine man came to our community, set up his tent, and stayed for a week. Of course, like all traveling medicine men, his remedies were cure-alls. One night in making his talk before the crowd, he mentioned the fact that his wonderful concoction, taken with the pamphlet that he would furnish, both ITS CAUSE AND CURE 23 for the sum of one dollar, would cure stammer- ing. I didn't have the dollar, so I did not buy. But the next day I went back, and I took the dol- lar along. He got my dollar, and I still have the book. Of course, I received no benefit what- ever. I later came to the conclusion that the medicine man had been in the neighborhood long enough to have pointed out to him "BEN BOGUE'S BOY WHO STUTTEBS" (as I was known) and had decided that when I was in his audience a hint or two on the virtues of his wonderful remedy in cases of stammering, would foe sufficient to extract a dollar from me for a tryout. These experiences, however, were valuable to me, even though they were costly, for they taught me a badly-needed lesson, to wit: That drugs and medicines are not a cure for stammering. Many of the people who came in contact with me, and those who talked the matter over with my parents, said that I would outgrow the trouble. "All that is necessary," remarked one man, "is for him to forget that he stammers, and the trouble will be gone." This was a rather foolish suggestion and sim- ply proved how little the man knew about the 24 STAMMERING subject. In the first place, a stammerer cannot forget his difficulty who can say that he would be cured if he did? You might as well say to a man holding a hot poker, "If you will only forget that the poker is hot, it will be cool." It takes something more than forgetfulness to cure stammering. The belief held by both my parents and myself that I would outgrow my difficulty was one of the gravest mistakes we ever made. Had I fol- lowed the advice of others who believed in the outgrowing theory it eventually would have caused me to become a confirmed stammerer, entirely beyond hope of cure. Today, as a result of twenty-eight years' daily contact with stammerers,! know that stammering cannot be outgrown. The man who suggests that it is possible to cure stammering by outgrowing it is doing a great injustice to the stammerer, because he is giving him a false hope in fact the most futile hope that any stammerer ever had. I wish I could paint in the sky, in letters of fire, the truth that "Stammering cannot be outgrown," because this, of all things, is the most frequent pitfall of the stammerer, his greatest delusion and one of the most prolific causes of continued suffer- ITS CAUSE AND CURE 25 ing. I know whereof I speak, because I tried it myself. I know how many different people held up to me the hope that I would outgrow it. My father offered me a valuable shotgun if I would stop stammering. My mother offered me money, a watch and a horse and buggy. These inducements made me strain every nerve to stop my imperfect utterance, but all to no avail. At this time I knew nothing of the underlying prin- ciples of speech and any effort which I made to stop my stammering was merely a crude, misdi- rected attempt which naturally had no chances for success. I learned that prizes will never cure stammer- ing. I found out too, something I have never since forgotten: that the man, woman or child who stammers needs no inducement to cause him to desire to be cured, because the change from his condition as a stammerer to that of a non- stammerer is of more inducement to the sufferer than all the money you could offer him. I have never yet seen a man, woman or child who wanted to stammer or stutter. The offer of prizes doing no good, I took long trips to get my mind off the affliction. I did 26 STAMMERING everything in my power, worked almost day and night, exerted every effort I could command it was all in vain. The idea that I would finally outgrow my difficulty was strengthened in the minds of my parents and friends by the fact that there were times when my impediment seemed almost to dis- appear, but to our surprise and disappointment, it always came back again, each time in a more aggravated form; each time with a stronger hold upon me than ever before. I found out, then, one of the fundamental characteristics of stammering its intermittent tendency. In other words, I discovered that a partial relief from the difficulty was one of the true symptoms of the malady. And I learned further that this relief is only temporary and not what we first thought it to be, viz: a sign that the disorder was leaving. CHAPTER III MY SEAECH CONTINUES MY parents' efforts to have me cured, how- ever, did not cease with my visit to the medicine man. We were still looking for some- thing that would bring relief. My teacher, Miss Cora Critchlow, handed me an advertisement one day, telling me of a man who claimed to be able to cure stammering by mail. In the hope that I would get some good from the treatment, my parents sent this mail order man a large sum of money. In return for this I was furnished with instructions to do a number of useless things, such as holding toothpicks between my teeth, talking through my nose, whistling before I spoke a word, and many other foolish things. It was at this time that I learned once and for all, the imprudence of throwing money away on these mail order "cures," so-called, and I made up my mind to bother no more with this man and his kind. So far as the mail order instructions were con- cerned, they were crude and unscientific merely 28 STAMMERING a hodge-podge of pseudo-technical phraseology and crass ignorance a meaningless jargon scarcely intelligible to the most highly educated, and practically impossible of interpretation by the average stammerer who was supposed to fol- low the course. Even after I had, by persistent effort, interpreted the instructions and followed them closely for many months, there was not a sign of the slightest relief from my trouble. It was evident to me even then that I could never cure myself by following a mail cure. Today, after twenty-eight years of experience in the cure of stammering, I can say with full authority, that stammering cannot be successfully treated by mail. The very nature of the diffi- culty, as well as the method of treatment, make it impossible to put the instructions into print or to have the stammerer follow out the method from a printed sheet. As I approached manhood, my impediment began to get worse. My stuttering changed to stammering. Instead of rapidly repeating syl- lables or words, I was unable to begin a word. I stood transfixed, my limbs drawing themselves into all kinds of unnatural positions. There were violent spasmodic movements of the head, and ITS CAUSE AND CURE 29 contractions of my whole body. The muscles of my throat would swell, affecting the respiratory organs, and causing a curious barking sound. When I finally got started, I would utter the first part of the sentence slowly, gradually increase the speed, and make a rush toward the end. At other times, when attempting to speak, my lips would pucker up, firmly set together, and I would be unable to separate them, until my breath was exhausted. Then I would gasp for more breath, struggling with the words I desired to speak, until the veins of my forehead would swell, my face would become red, and I would sink back, wholly unable to express myself, and usually being obliged to resort to writing. These paroxysms left me extremely nervous and in a seriously weakened condition. After one of these attacks, the cold perspiration would break out on my forehead in great beads and I would sink into the nearest chair, where I would be compelled to remain until I had regained my strength. My affliction was taking all my energy, sap- ping my strength, deadening my mental facul- ties, and placing me at a hopeless disadvantage in every way. I could do nothing that other 30 STAMMERING people did. I appeared unnatural. I was ner- vous, irritable, despondent. This despondency now brought about a peculiar condition. I began to believe that everyone was more or less an enemy of mine. And still worse, I came to be- lieve that I was an enemy of myself, which feel- ing threw me into despair, the depths of which I do not wish to recall, even now. I was not only miserably unhappy myself, I made everyone else around me unhappy, although I did it, not intentionally, but because my affliction had caused me to lose control of myself. In this con'dition, my nerves were strained to the breaking point all day long, and many a night I can remember crying myself to sleep crying purely to relieve that stored-up nervous tension, and falling off to sleep as a result of exhaustion. As I said before, there were periods of grace when the trouble seemed almost to vanish and I would be delighted to believe that perhaps it was gone forever happy hope I But it was but a delusion, a mirage in the distance, a new road to lead me astray. The affliction always returned, as every stammerer knows returned worse than ITS CAUSE AND CUKE 31 before. All the hopes that I would outgrow my trouble, were found to be false hopes. For me, there was no such thing as outgrowing it and I have since discovered that after the age of six only one-fifth of one per cent, ever outgrow the trouble. Another thing which I always thought peculiar when I was a stammerer was the fact that I had practically no difficulty in talking to animals when I was alone with them. I remember very well that we had a large bulldog called Jim, which I was very fond of. I used to believe that Jim understood my troubles better than any friend I had, unless it was Old Sol, our family driving horse. Jim used to go with me on all my jaunts I could talk to him by the hour and never stammer a word. And Old Sol well, when everything seemed to be going against me, I used to go out and talk things over with Old Sol. Somehow he seemed to understand he used to whinney softly and rub his nose against my shoulder as if to say, "I understand, Bennie, I understand!" Somehow my father had discovered this pe- culiarity of my affliction that is, my ability to talk to animals or when alone. Something sug- 32 STAMMERING gested to him that my stammering could be cured, if I could be kept by myself for several weeks. With this thought in mind, he suggested that I go on a hunting and fishing trip in the wilds of the northwest, taking no guide, no com- panion of any sort, so that there would be no necessity of my speaking to any human being while I was gone. My father's idea was that if my vocal organs had a complete rest, I would be restored to per- fect speech. As I afterwards proved to my own satisfaction by actual trial, this idea was entirely wrong. You can not hope to restore the proper action of your vocal organs by ceasing to use them. The proper functioning of any bodily organ is the result, not of ceasing to use it at all, but rather of using it correctly. This can be very easily proved to the satisfac- tion of any one. Take the case of the small boy who boasts of his muscle. He is conscious of an increasing strength in the muscles of his arm not because he has failed to use these muscles but because he has used them continually, causing a faster-than-ordinary development. You can readily imagine that I looked forward to my "vacation" with keen anticipation, for I ITS CAUSE AND CUKE 33 had never been up in the northwest and I was full of stories I had read and ideas I had formed of its wonders. The trip, lasting two weeks, did me scarcely any good at all. The most I can say for it is that it quieted my nerves and put me in some- what better physical condition, which a couple of weeks in the outdoor country would do for any growing boy. But this trip did not cure my stammering, nor did it tend to alleviate the intensity of the trouble in the least, save through a lessened nervous state for a few days. Today, after twenty-eight years' experience, I know that it would be just as sensible to say that a wagon stuck in the soft mud would get out by "resting" there as it is to say that stammering can be eradicated by allowing the vocal organs to rest through disuse. Shortly after my return from the trip to the northwest, my father died, with the result that our household was, for a time, very much broken up. For a while, at least, my stammering, though not forgotten, did not receive a great deal of attention, for there were many other things to think about. The summer following my father's death, how- 84 STAMMERING ever, I began again my so-far fruitless search for a cure for my stammering, this time placing myself under the care and instruction of a man claiming to be "The World's Greatest Specialist in the Cure of Stammering." He may have been the world's greatest specialist, but not in the cure of stammering. He did succeed, however, by the use of his absurd methods, in putting me through a course that resulted in the membrane and lining of my throat and vocal organs becoming irritated and inflamed to such an extent that I was com- pelled to undergo treatment for a throat affec- tion that threatened to be as serious as the stam- mering itself. I tried everything that came to my attention first one thing and then another but without results. Still I refused to be discouraged. I kept on and on, my mother constantly encouraging and reassuring me. And you will later see that I found a method that cured me. There are always those who stand idly about and say, "It can't be donel" Such people as these laughed at Fulton with his steamboat, they laughed at Stephenson and his steam locomotive, they laughed at Wright and the airplane. ITS CAUSE AND CURE 35 They say, "It can't be done" but it is done, nevertheless. I turned a deaf ear to the people who tried to convince me that it couldn't be done. I had a firm belief in that old adage, "Where there is a will there is a way," and I made another of my own, which said, "I will find a way or make oneT' And I did! CHAPTER IV A STAMMERER HUNTS A JOB AFTER recovering from my sad experiment with the "Wonderful Specialist," I did not want to go home and listen to the Anvil Chorus of "It Can't Be Donel" and "I Told You Sol" I had no desire to be the object of laughter as well as pity. So I tried to get a job in that same city. I went from office to office but nobody had a job for a man who stammered. Finally I did land a job, however, such as it was. My duties were to operate the elevator in a hotel. How I managed to get that job, I often wonder now, for nobody on whom I called had any place for a boy or man who stammered. I thought it would be easy to find a job where I wouldn't need to talk, but when I started out to look for this job, I found it wasn't so easy after all. Almost any job requires a man who can talk. This I had learned in my own search for a place. But somehow or other, I managed to get that job as elevator boy in a hotel. For the work as elevator boy I was paid three ITS CAUSE AND CURE 37 dollars a week. Wasn't that great pay for a man grown? But that's what I got. That is, I got it for a little while, until I lost my job. For lose it I did before very long. I found out that I couldn't do much with even an elevator boy's job at three dollars a week unless I could talk. My employer found it out, too, and then he found somebody who could take my place a boy who could answer when spoken to. Well, here I was out of a job again. I am afraid I came pretty near being discouraged about that time. Things looked pretty hopeless for me it was mighty hard work to get a job and the place didn't last long after I had gotten it. But, nevertheless, the only thing to do was to try again. I started the search all over again. I tried first one place and then another. One man wanted me to start out as a salesman. He showed me how I could make more money than I had ever made in my life convinced me that I could make it. Then I started to tell my part of the story but I didn't get very far before he discovered that I was a stammerer. That was enough for him with a gesture of hopelessness, he turned to his desk. "You'll never do, young 38 STAMMERING man, you'll never do. You can't even talk!" And the worst of it was that he was right. I once thought I had landed a job as stock chaser in a factory, but here, too, stammering barred the way, for they told me that even the stock chaser had to be able to deliver verbal mes- sages from one foreman to another. I didn't dare to try that. Eventually, I drifted around to the Union News Company. They wanted a boy to sell newspapers on trains running out over the Grand Trunk Railway. I took the job the last job in the world I should have expected to hold, because of all the places a newsboy's job is one where you need to have a voice and the ability to talk. I hope no stammerer ever has a position that causes him as much humiliation and suffering as that job caused me. You can imagine what it meant to me to go up and down the aisles of the train, calling papers and every few moments finding out that I couldn't say what I started out to say and then go gasping and grunting down the aisle making all sorts of facial grimaces. How the passengers laughed at me! And how they made fun of me and asked me all sorts of questions just to hear me try to talk. It almost ITS CAUSE AND CURE 39 made me wish I could never see a human being again, so keen was the suffering and so tense were my nerves as a result of this work. I don't believe I ever did anything that kept me in a more frenzied mental state than this work of trying to sell newspapers and it wasn't very long (as I had expected) until the manager found out my situation and gently let me out. Then I gave up, all at once. Was I discour- aged? Well, perhaps. But not exactly discour- aged. Rather I saw the plain hopelessness of trying to get or hold a job in my condition. So I prepared to go home. I didn't want to do it, because I knew the neighbors and friends round about would be ready for me with, "I told you so" and "I knew it couldn't be done" and a lot of gratuitous information like that. But I gave up, nevertheless, deeply disap- pointed to think that once again I had failed to be cured of stammering, yet all the while resolv- ing just as firmly as ever that I would try again and that I would never give up hope as long as there remained anything for me to do. And this rule I followed out, month after month and year after year, until in the end I was richly rewarded for my patience and persistence. CHAPTER V FURTHEB FUTILE ATTEMPTS TO BE CUBED next summer I decided to visit eastern J_ institutions for the cure of stammering and determine if these could do any more for me than had already been done which as the reader has seen, was practically nothing. I bought a ticket for Philadelphia, where I remained for some time, and where I gained more information of value than in all of my previous efforts combined. I found in the Quaker City an old man who had made speech defects almost a life study. He knew more about the true principles of speech and the underlying fundamentals in the produc- tion of voice than all of the rest put together. He taught me these things, and gave me a solid foundation on which to build. True, he did not cure my stammering. But that was not because ke failed to understand its cause, but merely be- cause he had not worked out the correct method of removing the cause. It was this man who first brought home to me the fact that principles of speech are constant, ITS CAUSE AND CUBE 41 that they never change and that every person who talks normally follows out the same princi- ples of speech, while every person who stutters or stammers violates these principles of speech. That is the basis of sound procedure for the cure of stammering and I must acknowledge my in- debtedness to this sincere old gentleman who did so much for me in the way of knowledge, even though he did but little for me in the way of results. After leaving Philadelphia, I visited Pitts- burgh, Baltimore, Washington, New York, Bos- ton and other eastern cities, searching for a cure, but did not find it. I was benefited very little. These experiences, however, all possessed a cer- tain value, although I did not know it at the time. They taught me the things which would not work and by a simple process of elimination I later found the things which would. Finally, however, having become disgusted with my eastern trip, I bought a ticket for home and boarded the train more nearly convinced than ever that I had an incurable case of stam- mering. Some time after trying my experiment with the eastern schools, I saw the advertisement of 42 STAMMERING a professor from Chicago saying that he would be at Fort Wayne, Indiana, (which was 40 miles from my home) , for a week. He was there. So was I. But to my sorrow. I paid him twenty dollars for which he taught me a few simple breathing and vocal exercises, most of which I already knew by heart, having been drilled in them time and again. This fellow was like so many others who claimed to cure stam- mering he was in the business just because there were stammerers to cure, and not because he knew anything about it. He treated the ef- fects of the trouble and did not attempt to re- move the cause. The fact of the matter is, I doubt whether he knew anything about the cause. Then one Sunday while reading a Cincinnati Sunday newspaper, I ran across an advertise- ment of a School of Elocution, in which was the statement, "Stammering Positively Cured!" Whenever I saw a sign "Vocal Culture" I be- came interested, so I clipped the advertisement, corresponded with the school and not many Sun- days later, being able to secure excursion rates to Cincinnati, I made the trip and prepared to begin my work. The cost of the course was only fifty dollars ITS CAUSE AND CURE 43 and I thought I would be getting cured mighty cheap if I succeeded. So I gave this school a "whirl" with the idea of going back home in a short time cured to the surprise of my family and friends. But I was doomed to disappoint- ment. I took the twenty lessons, but went home stammering as badly as ever. You can imagine how I felt as the Big Four train whistled at the Wabash river just before pulling into the Wabash station, where I was to get off. Here was another failure that could be checked up against the instructor who knew nothing whatever about the cause of stammering. The whole idea of the course was to cultivate voice and make me an orator. That was very fine and would, no doubt, have done me a great deal of good, but it was of no use to try to cultivate a fine voice until I could use that voice in the normal way. The finest voice in the world is of no use if you stammer, and cannot use it. The school of elocution went the same way as all the rest it was a total failure so far as curing my stammering was concerned. By this time, my effort to be cured of stam- mering had become a habit, just as eating and sleeping are habits. I was determined to be 44 STAMMERING cured. I made up my mind I would never give up. True, I often said to myself, "I may never be cured," but in the same breath I resolved that if I was not, it could never be said that it was because I was a "quitter." My next experiment was with a man who claimed he could cure my stammering in one hour. Think of it. Here I had been, spending weeks and months trying out just ONE way of cure and here was a man who could do the whole job in one hour. Wonderful power he must possess, I thought. Of course, I did not believe he could do it. I could not believe it. It was not believ- able. But nevertheless, in my effort to be cured, I had resolved to leave no stone unturned. I made up my mind that the only way to be sure that I was not missing the successful method was to try them all. So I put myself under this man's hand. He was a hypnotist. He felt able to restore speech with a hypnotic sleep and the proper hypnotic suggestion while I was in the trance. But like all the fake fol-de-rol with which I had come in contact, he did not even make an impression. I will say in behalf of this hypnotic stammer doctor, however, that he was following distin- ITS CAUSE AND CURE 45 guished precedent in attempting to cure stam- mering by hypnotism. German professors in particular have been especially zealous in follow- ing out this line of endeavor and many of them have written volumes on the subject only to end up with the conclusion (in their own minds, at least) that it is a failure. Hypnotism may be said to be a condition where the will of the sub- ject is entirely dormant and his every act and thought controlled by the mind of the hypnotist. I do not know, not having been conscious at the time, but it is not improbable that while in the hypnotic state, I was able to talk without stam- mering, since my words were directed by the mind of the professor, and not my own mind. But inasmuch as I couldn't have the professor carried around with me through the rest of my lifetime in order to use his mind, the treatment could not benefit me. I next got in touch with an honest-looking old man with a beard like one of the prophets, who assured me with a great deal of professional dig- nity, that stammering was a mere trifle for a magnetic healer like himself and that he could cure it entirely in ten treatments. So I planked down the specified amount for ten treatments, 46 STAMMERING and went to him regularly three times a week for almost a month, when he explained to me, again with a plenitude of professionalism, that my case was a very peculiar one and that it would require ten more treatments. But I could not figure out how, if ten treatments had done me no good, ten more would do any better. So I declined to try his methods any further. Once again I said to myself, "Well, this has failed, too I wonder what next?" The next happened to be electrical treatments. When I visited the electrical treatment specialist, he explained to me in a very effective manner just how (according to his views) stammering was caused by certain contractions of the muscles of the vocal organs, etc., and told me that his treatment surely was the thing to eliminate this contraction and leave my speech entirely free from stammering. I knew something about my stammering then, but not a great deal conse- quently his explanation sounded plausible to me and appealed to me as being very sensible and so I decided to give it a trial. I was glad after it was over that I had received no bad effects that was all the cause I had to be glad, for fee had not changed my stammering one iota, nor ITS CAUSE AND CURE 47 had he changed my speech in any way to make it easier for me to talk. Thus, had I found another one of the things that will not work and chalked up another failure against my attempts to be cured of stammering. By this time, the reader may well wonder why I was not discouraged in my efforts to be cured. Well, who will say that I was not? I believe I was as far as it was possible for me to be dis- couraged at that time. But despite all my fail- ures, I had made up my mind never to give up until I was cured of stammering. I set myself doggedly to the task of ridding myself of an impediment that I knew would always hold me down and prevent any measure of success. I stayed with this task. I never gave up. I kept this one thing always in mind. It was a life job with me if necessary and I was not a "quitter." So failures and discouragements simply steeled me to more intense endeavors to be cured. And while these endeavors cost my parents many hun- dreds of dollars and cost me many years of time, still, I feel today that they were worth while not worth while enough to go through again, or worth while enough to recommend to any one else but at least not a total loss to me. CHAPTER VI I BEFUSE TO BE DISCOURAGED AFTER I had tried the electric treatment and found it wanting, I heard of a clairvoyant who could, by looking at a person, tell his name, age, occupation, place of residence, etc., and could cure all diseases and afflictions including stammering. So I thought I would give him a trial. He claimed to work through a "greater power" whatever that was and so I paid him his fee to see the "greater power" work and to be cured of stammering, as per promise. But there was nothing doing in the line of a cure all I got in trying to be cured, was another chap- ter added to my book of experience. Following this experience, I tried an osteo- path, whose methods, however good they might have been, affected merely the physical organs and could not hope to reach the real cause of my trouble. I do not doubt that this man was en- tirely sincere in explaining his own science to me in a way that led me to build up hopes of relief ITS CAUSE AND CURE 49 from that method. He simply did not under- stand stammering and its causes and was there- fore not prepared to treat it. I was told of another doctor who claimed to be able to cure stammering. When I called to see him, he had me wait in his reception room for nearly two hours, for the purpose, I presume, of giving me the impression that he was a very busy man. Then he called me into his private consul- tation room, where he apparently had all of the modern and up-to-date surgical instruments. He put me through a thorough examination, after which he said that the only thing to cure me was a surgical operation to have my tonsils removed. I was not willing to consent to the use of the knife, so therefore the operation was never per- formed. Since that time, however, the practice of oper- ating on children especially for the removal of adenoids and tonsils has become very popular and quite frequently this is the remedy prescribed for various and sundry ailments of childhood. In no case must a parent expect to eradicate stuttering or stammering by the removal of the tonsils. The operation, beneficial as it may be in other ways, 50 STAMMERING does not prevent the child from stammering for the operation does not remove the cause of the stammering that cause is mental, not physical. CHAPTER VII THE BENEFIT OF MANY FAILURES I HAD now tried upwards of fifteen different methods for the cure of my stammering. I had tried the physician; the surgeon; the elocu- tion teacher; the hypnotic specialist; the osteo- path; a clairvoyant; a mail-order scheme; the world's greatest speech specialist so-called, and several other things. My parents had spent hun- dreds of dollars of money trying to have me cured. They had spared no effort, stopped at no cost. And yet I now stammered worse than I had ever stammered before. Everything I had tried had heen a worthless failure. Nothing had been of the least permanent good to me. My money was gone, months of time had been wasted and I now began to wonder if I had not been very foolish indeed, in going to first one man and then another, trying to be cured. "Wouldn't it have been better," I asked, "if I had resigned myself to a life as a stammerer and let it go at that?" My father before me stammered. So did my grandfather and no less than fourteen of my 52 STAMMERING blood relations. My affliction was inherited and therefore supposedly incurable. At least so I was told by honest physicians and other scientific observers who believed what they said and who had no desire to make any personal gain by trafficking in my infirmity. These men told me frankly that their skill and knowledge held out no hope for me and advised me from the very beginning to save my money and avoid the pit- falls of the many who would profess to be able to cure me. But I had disregarded this honest advice, sin- cerely given, had spent my money and my time and what had I gotten? Would I not have been better off if I had listened to the advice and stayed at home? Everything seemed to answer "Yes," but down in my heart I felt that things were better as they were. Certainly some good must come of all this effort surely it could not all be wasted. "But yet," I argued with myself, "what good can come of it?" Stammering was fast ruining my life. It had already taken the joy out of my childhood and had made school a task almost too heavy to be undertaken. It had marked my youth with a somber melancholy, and now that youth ITS CAUSE AND CURE 58 was slipping away from me with no hope that the future held anything better for me than the past. Something had to be done. I was overpowered by that thought something had to be done. It had to be done at once. I had come to the turn- ing point in my life. Like Hamlet, I found my- self repeating over and over again, "To be or not to be, That is the question'' Was I discouraged? No, I will not admit that I was discouraged, but I was pretty nearly re- signed to a life without fluent speech, nearly con- vinced that future efforts to find a cure for stam- mering would be fruitless and bring no better results. It was about this time that I stepped into the office of my cousin, then a successful lawyer and district attorney of his city, later the first vice- president of one of the great American railroads with headquarters in New York, and now retired. He was one of those men in whose vocabulary there is no such word as "fail." After I had talked with him for quite a while, he looked at me, and with his kindly, almost fatherly smile asked, "Why don't you cure yourself?" 54 STAMMERING "Cure myself?" I queried. "How do you ex- pect me, a young man with no scientific training, to cure myself, when the learned doctors, sur- geons and scientists of the country have given me up as incurable?" "That doesn't make any difference," he re- plied, " 'while there is life, there is hope* and it's a sure thing that nobody ever accomplished any- thing worth while by accepting the failures of others as proof that the thing couldn't be done. Whitney would never have invented the cotton gin if he had accepted the failures of others as final. Columbus picked out a road to America and assured the skeptics that there was no danger of his sailing 'over the edge.' Of course, it had never been done before, but then Columbus went ahead and did it himself. He didn't take some- body else's failure as an indication of what he could do. If he had, a couple of hundred years later, somebody else would have discovered it and put Columbus in the class with the rest of the weak-kneed who said it couldn't be done, just because it never had been done. "The progress of this country, Ben," continued my cousin, "is founded on the determination of men who refuse to accept the failures of others ITS CAUSE AND CURE 55 as proof that things can't be done at all. Now you've got a mighty good start. You've found out all about these other methods you know that they have failed and in a lot of cases, you know WHY they have failed. Now, why don* t you begin where they have left off and find out how to succeed?" The thought struck me like a bolt from a clear sky: "BEGIN WHEEE THE OTHERS LEAVE OFF AND FIND OUT HOW TO SUCCEED!" I kept saying it over and over to myself, "Begin where the others leave off begin where the others leave off I" This thought put high hope in my heart. It seemed to ring like a call from afar. "Begin where the others leave off and find out how to succeed." I kept thinking about that all the way home. I thought of it at the table that evening. I said nothing. I went to bed but I didn't go to sleep, for singing through my brain was that sentence, "Begin where the others leave off and find out how to succeed!" Right then and there I made the resolve that resulted in my curing myself. "I WILL do it," I said, "I will begin where the others leave off and I WILL SUCCEED ! !" Then and there I deter- mined to master the principles of speech, to chart 56 STAMMERING the methods that had been used by others, to find their defects, to locate the cause of stammering, to find out how to remove that cause and remove it from myself, so that I, like the others whom I so envied, could talk freely and fluently. That resolution that determination which first fired me that evening never left me. It marked the turning point in my whole life. I was no longer dependent upon others, no longer looking to physicians or elocution teachers or hypnotists to cure me of stammering. I was looking to myself. If I was to be cured, then I must be the one to do it. This responsibility sobered me. It intensified my determination. It emphasized in my own mind the need for per- sistent effort, for a constant striving toward this one thing. And absorbed with this idea, living and working toward this one end, I began my work. CHAPTER VIII BEGINNING WHERE OTHEBS HAD LEFT OFF FROM the moment that my resolution took shape, my plans were all laid with one thing in mind to cure myself of stammering. I de- termined, first of all, to master the principles of speech. I remembered very well, indeed, the admonition of Prof. J. J. Mills, President of Earlham College, on the day I left the institu- tion. "You have been a hard-working student," he said, "but your success will never be complete until you learn to talk as others talk. Cure your stammering at any cost." That was the thing I had determined to do. And having determined upon that course, I resolved to let nothing swerve me from it. I began the study of anatomy. I studied the lungs, the throat, the brain nothing escaped me. I pursued my studies with the avidity of the medical student wrapped up in his work. I read all the books that had been published on the sub- ject of stammering. I sought eagerly for trans- lations of foreign books on the subject. I lived 58 STAMMERING in the libraries. I studied late at night and arose early in the morning, that I might he at my work again. It absorbed me. I thought of the subject by day and dreamed of it by night. It was never out of my mind. I was living it, breathing it, eating it. I had not thought myself capable of such concentration as I was putting in on the pursuit of the truth as regards stammering and its cure. With the knowledge that I had gained from celebrated physicians, specialists and institutions throughout this country and Europe, I extended my experiments and investigation. I had an ex- cellent subject on which to experiment myself. Progress was slow at first so slow, in fact, that I did not realize until later that it was progress at all. Nothing but my past misery, backed up by my present determination to be free from the impediment that hampered me at every turn, could have kept me from giving up. But at last, after years of effort, after long nights of study and days of research, I was rewarded by success I found and perfected a method of control of the articulatory organs as well as of the brain centers controlling the organs of speech. I had learned the cause of stammering and stuttering. ITS CAUSE AND CUBE 59 All of the mystery with which the subject had been surrounded by so-called specialists, fell away. In all its clearness, I saw the truth. I saw how the others, who had failed in my case, had failed because of ignorance. I saw that they had been treating effects, not causes. I saw exactly why their methods had not succeeded and could never succeed. In truth I had begun where the others left of and won success. The reader can imagine what this meant to me. It meant that at last I could speak clearly, distinctly, freely, and fluently, without those facial contortions that had made me an object of ridicule wherever I went. It meant that I could take my place in life, a man among men; that I could look the whole world in the face; that I could live and enjoy life as other normal persons lived and enjoyed it. At first my friends could not believe that my cure was permanent. Even my mother doubted the evidence of her own ears. But I knew the trouble would not come back, for the old fear was gone, the nervousness soon passed away, and a new feeling of confidence and self-reliance took hold of me, with the result that in a few weeks I was a changed man. People who had formerly 60 STAMMEEING avoided me because of my infirmity began to greet me with new interest. Gradually the old affliction was forgotten by those with whom I came into daily contact and by many I was thought of as a man who had never stammered. Even today, those who knew me when I stam- mered so badly I could hardly talk, are hardly able to believe that I am the same person who used to be known as "BEN BOGUE'S BOY WHO STUTTERS." For today I can talk as freely and fluently as anybody. I do not hesitate in the least. For years, I have not even known what it is to grope mentally for a word. I speak in public as well as in private conversation. I have no difficulty in talking over the telephone and in fact do not know the difference. In my work, I lecture to students and am invited to address scientific bodies, societies and educational gatherings, all of which I can accomplish without the slightest difficulty. Today, I can say with Terence, "I am a man and nothing that is human is alien to me." And I can go a step further and say to those who are afflicted as I was afflicted: "I have been a stam- merer. I know your troubles, your sorrows, your ITS CAUSE AND CURE 61 discouragements. I understand with an under- standing born of a costly experience." Man or woman, boy or girl, wherever you are, my heart goes out to you. Whatever your sta- tion in life, rich or poor, educated or unlettered, discouraged and hopeless, or determined and res- olute, I send you a message of hope, a message which, in the words of Dr. Russell R. Conwell, "has been affirmed and reaffirmed in the thou- sands of lives I have been privileged to watch. And the message is this: Neither heredity nor environment nor any obstacles superimposed by man can keep you from marching straight through to a cure, provided you are guided by a firm driving determination and have normal health and intelligence." To that end I commend to you the succeeding pages of this volume, where you will find in plain and simple language the things which I have spent more than thirty years in learning. May these pages open for you the door to freedom of speech as they have opened it for hundreds before vou. PART II STAMMERING AND STUTTERING The Causes, Peculiarities, Ten- dencies and Effects SPEECH DISORDERS DEFINED IN the diagnosis of speech disorders, there are almost as many different forms of defective utterance as there are cases, all of which forms, however, divide themselves into a few basic types. These various disorders might be broadly classi- fied into three classes: (1) Those resulting from carelessness in learning to speak; (2) Those which are of distinct mental form ; and (3) Those caused by a physical deformity in the organs of speech themselves. Regardless of under which of these three heads a ITS CAUSE AND CUBE 63 speech disorder may come, it is commonly spoken of by the laymen as a "speech impediment" or "a stoppage in speech" notwithstanding the fact that the characteristics of the various disorders are quite dissimilar. In certain of the disorders, (a) There is an inability to release a word; in others, (b) A tendency to repeat a syllable sev- eral times before the following syllable can be uttered ; in others, (c) The tendency to substitute an incor- rect sound for the correct one ; while in others, (d) The utterance is defective merely in the imperfect enunciation of sounds and syllables due to some organic defect, or to carelessness in learning to speak. While this volume has but little to do with speech disorders other than stammering and stuttering, the characteristics of the more common forms of speech impediment lisping, cluttering and hesi- tation, as well as stuttering and stammering will be discussed in this first chapter, in order 64 STAMMEEING that the reader may be able, in a general way at least, to differentiate between the various dis- orders. LISPING This is a very common form of speech disorder and one which manifests itself early in the life of the child. Lisping may be divided into three forms : ( 1 ) Negligent Lisping (2) Neurotic Lisping ( 3 ) Organic Lisping Negligent Lisping: This is a form of defective enunciation caused in most cases by parental neglect or the carelessness of the child himself in the pronunciation of words during the first few months of talking. This defective pronunciation in Negligent Lisping is caused either by a failure or an inability to observe others who speak cor- rectly. We learn to speak by imitation, and fail- ing to observe the correct method of speaking in others, we naturally fail to speak correctly our- selves. In Negligent Lisping, this inability prop- erly to imitate correct speech processes, results ITS CAUSE AND CURE 65 in the substitution of an incorrect sound for the correct one with consequent faulty formation of words. Organic Lisping: This results from an or- ganic or physical defect in the vocal organs, such as hare-lip, feeble lip, malformation of the tongue, defective teeth, overshot or undershot jaw, high palatal arch, cleft palate, defective palate, relaxed palate following an operation for adenoids, obstructed nasal passages or defective hearing. Neurotic Lisping: This is a form of speech marked by short, rapid muscular contractions in- stead of the smooth and easy action used in pro- ducing normal sounds. Neurotic Lisping is often found to be combined with stammering or stut- tering, which is quite logical, since it is similar, both as to cause and as to the presence of a men- tal disturbance. In Neurotic Lisping, the mus- cular movements are less spasmodic than in cases of stuttering, partaking more of the cramped sticking movement, common in stammering. STUTTERING Stuttering may be generally defined as the repetition rapid in some cases, slow in others 66 STAMMERING of a word or a syllable, before the following word or syllable can be uttered. Stuttering may take several forms, any one of which will fall into one of four phases : ( 1 ) Simple Phase (2) Advanced Phase (3) Mental Phase (4) Compound Phase Simple stuttering can be said to be a purely physical form of the difficulty. The Advanced Phase marks the stage of further progress where the trouble passes from the purely physical state into a condition that may be known as Mental- Physical. The distinctly Mental Phase is marked by symptoms indicating a mental cause for the trouble, the disorder usually having passed into this form from the simple or advanced stages of the malady. Stuttering may be combined with stammering in which case the condition repre- sents the Compound Phase of the trouble. Choreatic Stuttering: This originates in an at- tack of Acute Chorea or St. Vitus Dance, which leaves the sufferer in a condition where involun- tary and spasmodic muscular contractions, espe- ITS CAUSE AND CUBE 67 cially of the face, have become an established habit. This breaks up the speech in a manner somewhat similar to ordinary stuttering. Also known as "Tic Speech." Spastic Speech: This is often the result of in- fantile cerebral palsy, the characteristic symptom of the trouble being intense over-exertion, con- tinued throughout a sentence, the syllables being equal in length and very laboriously enunciated. In spastic speech, there is present a noticeable hyper-tonicity of the nerve fibers actuating the muscles used in speaking as well as marked con- tractions of the facial muscles. Unconscious Stuttering: This is a misnomer because there can be no such thing as unconscious stuttering. It appears that the person afflicted is not conscious of his difficulty for he insists that he does not s-s-s-s-tut-tut-tut-ter. Unconscious Stuttering is but a name for the disorder of a stutterer who is too stubborn to admit his own difficulty. Thought Stuttering: This is an advanced form of stuttering which is also known as Aphasia and 68 STAMMERING which is caused by the inability of the sufferer to recall the mental images necessary to the forma- tion of a word. Stuttering in its simpler forms is usually connected with the period of childhood, while aphasia is often connected with old age or injury. The aphasic person is excessively nerv- ous as is the stutterer; he undergoes the same anxiety to get his words out and the same fear of being ridiculous. In aphasia there is, however, no excessive muscular tension or cramp of the speech muscles. In these cases, the stutterer will sometimes repeat the first syllable ten or fifteen times with pauses between, being for a time un- able to recall what the second syllable is. It is, in other words, a habitual, but nevertheless tem- porary, inability to recall to mind the mental images necessary to produce the word or syllable desired to be spoken. This condition is more commonly known as Thought Lapse or the in- ability to think of what you desire to say. One investigator shows that the diagnosis of "insanity" with later commitment to an asylum occurred in the case of a bad stutterer. When excited he would go through the most extreme contortions and the wildest gesticulations in a vain attempt to finally get all of the word out, ITS CAUSE AND CURE 69 finally pacing up and down the room like one truly insane. This tendency to believe that the stutterer is insane because of the convulsive or spasmodic effort accompanying his efforts to speak, is a mistaken one, although there can be little doubt of the tendency of this condition finally to lead to insanity if not checked. HESITATION Hesitation is marked by a silent, choking effort, often accompanied by a fruitless opening and closing of the mouth. Hesitation is a stage through which the sufferer usually passes before he reaches the condition known as Elementary Stammering. STAMMERING Stammering is a condition in which the person afflicted is unable to begin a word or a sentence no matter how much effort may be directed toward the attempt to speak, or how well they may know what they wish to say. In stammer- ing, there is the "sticking" as the stammerer terms it, or the inability to express a sound. The dif- ference between stammering and stuttering lies in the fact that in stuttering, the disorder mani- fests itself in loose and hurried (or in some cases, 70 STAMMERING slow) repetitions of sounds, syllables or words, while in the case of stammering, the manifesta- tion takes the form of an inability to express a sound, or to begin a word or a sentence. Elementary Stammering: This is the simplest form of this disorder. Here, the convulsive effort is not especially noticeable and the marked results of long-continued stammering are not apparent. Most cases pass quickly from the elementary stage unless checked in their incipiency. Spasmodic Stammering: This marks the stage of the disorder where the effort to speak brings about marked muscular contractions and pro- nounced spasmodic efforts, resulting in all sorts of facial contortions, grimaces and uncontrolled jer kings of the head, body and limbs. Thought Stammering: This, like Thought- Stuttering, is a form of Aphasia and manifests itself in the inability of the stammerer to think of what he wishes to say. In other words, the thought-stammerer, like the thought-stutterer, is unable to recall the mental images necessary to the production of a certain word or sound and is, therefore, unable to produce sounds correctly. ITS CAUSE AND CURE 71 The manifestations described under Thought Stuttering are present in Thought Stammering also. Combined Stammering and Stuttering: This is a compound form of difficulty in which the suf- ferer finds himself at times not only unable to utter a sound or begin a word or a sentence but also is found to repeat a sound or syllable several times before the following syllable can be uttered. Any case of stuttering or stammering in the Sim- ple or Elementary Stages may pass into Com- bined Stammering and Stuttering without warn- ing or without the knowledge, even, of the stam- merer or stutterer. CHAPTER II THE CAUSES OF STUTTERING ANB STAMMERING ONE of the first questions asked by the stut- terer or stammerer is, "What is the cause of my trouble?" In asking this question, the stammerer is getting at the very essence of the successful method of treatment of his malady, for there is no method of curing stuttering, stammer- ing and kindred defects of speech that can bring real and permanent relief from the affliction unless it attacks the cause of the trouble and removes that cause. Inasmuch as this book has to do almost entirely with the two defective forms of utterance known as stuttering and stammering, we will at this time drop all reference to the other forms of speech impediments and from this time forth refer only to stuttering and stammering. These forms of defective speech are manifested by the inability to express words in the normal, natural manner freely and fluently. In other words, there is a marked departure from the ITS CAUSE AND CURE 73 normal in the methods used by the stammerer in the production of speech. It is necessary, there- fore, before taking up the discussion of the causes of stuttering and stammering, to determine the method by which voice is produced in the normal individual, so that we can compare this normal production of speech with the faulty method adopted by the stutterer or stammerer and learn where the fault is and what is the cause of it. Let us now proceed to do this : In other words, let us ask the question: "How is speech produced in the normal person not afflicted with defective utterance?" Voice is produced by the vocal organs much in the same manner as sounds are produced on a saxophone or clarinet, by forcing a current of air through an aperture over which is a reed which vibrates with the sounds. The low tones pro- duced by the saxophone or clarinet result from the enlargement of the aperture, while the higher tones are produced by contracting the opening. Variations of pitch in the human voice are also effected by elongation and contraction of the vocal cords with comparative slackness or tension, as in the violin. It would be of no value, and, in fact, would 74 STAMMEEING only serve to confuse the layman, to know the duties or functions of the various organs or parts entering into the production of speech. Suffice it to say that in the "manufacture" of words, there are concerned the glottis, the larynx, tho- rax, diaphragm, lungs, soft palate, tongue, teeth and lips. In the production of the sounds and the combination of sounds that we call words, each of these organs of speech has its own par- ticular duty to perform and the failure of any one of these organs properly to perform that duty may result in defective utterance of some form. Brain Control: It must be borne in mind that for any one or all of the organs of speech to become operative or to manifest any action, they must be innervated or activated by impulses orig- inating in the brain. For instance, if it is necessary that the glottis be contracted to a point which we will call "half- open" for the production of a certain sound, the brain must first send a message to that organ before the necessary movement can take place. In saying the word "you," for instance, it would be necessary for the tongue to press tip against the base of the lower row of front teeth. But ITS CAUSE AND CURE 75 before the tongue can assume that position, it is necessary that the brain send to the tongue a message directing what is to be done. When the number of different organs involved in the production of the simplest word of one syllable is considered (such as the word "you" just mentioned), and when it is further consid- ered that separate brain messages must be sent to each of the organs, muscles or parts concerned in the production of that word, then it will be understood that the process of speaking is a most complicated one, involving not only numer- ous physical organs but also intricate mental processes. When all of the organs concerned in the pro- duction of speech are working properly and when the brain sends prompt and correct brain im- pulses to them, the result is perfect speech, the free, fluent and easy conversation of the good talker. But when any or all of these organs fail to function properly, due to inco-ordination, the result is discord and defective utterance. Cause of Defective Utterance: Now, let us consider the cause of defective utterance. What is it that causes the organ, muscle or parts to fail 76 STAMMERING properly to function? The first and most obvi- ous conclusion would be that there was some inherent defect in the organ, muscle or part which failed to function. But experience has proved that this is usually not the case. An examination of two thousand cases of defective utterance, including many others besides stuttering and stammering, revealed three-tenths of one per cent, with an organic defect that is, a defect in the organs themselves. In other words, only three persons out of every thousand afflicted with defective utterance were found to have any phys- ical shortcoming that was responsible for the affliction. Take any of these two thousand cases say those that stammered, for instance. What was the cause of their difficulty, if it did not lie in the organs used in the production of speech? This is the question that long puzzled investigators in the field of speech defects. Like Darwin, they said: "It must be this, for if it is not this, then what is it?" If stuttering and stammering are not caused by actual physical defects in the organs themselves, what then can be the cause? Due to a Lack of Co-ordination: Cases of stammering and stuttering where no organic ITS CAUSE AND CUKE 77 defect is present are due to a lack of co-ordination between the brain and the muscles of speech. In other words, the harmony between the brain and the speech organs which normally result in smooth working and perfect speech has been interrupted. The brain impulses are no longer properly transmitted to and executed by the muscles of speech. This failure to transmit properly brain mes- sages or this lack of co-ordination may take one of two forms : it may result in an iwder-mnerva- tion of the organs of speech, which results in loose, uncontrolled repetitions of a word, sound or syllable, or it may take the form of an over- innervation of the vocal organ with the result that it is so intensely contracted as to be entirely closed, causing the "sticking" or inability to pro- nounce even a sound, so common to the stam- merer. Suppose that you try to say the word "tray." Do not articulate the sounds. Merely make the initial effort to say it. What happens? Simply this : The tip of the tongue comes in contact with the upper front teeth at their base and as you progress in your attempt to say "t," the tongue flattens itself against the roof of the mouth, mov- 78 STAMMERING ing from the tip of the tongue toward its base If you are a stammerer, you will probably find in endeavoring to say this word, that your vocal organs fail to respond quickly and correctly to the set of brain messages which should result in the proper enunciation of the word "tray." Your tongue clings to the roof of your mouth, your mouth remains open, you suffer a rush of blood to the face, due to your powerful and unsuccess- ful effort to articulate, and the word refuses to be spoken. Now, in order to dissociate "lack of co-ordi- nation," from stammering and to get an idea of its real nature, let us imagine an experiment which can be conducted by any one, whether they stammer or not. You see on the table before you a pencil. You want to write and consequently you want to pick up the pencil. Therefore, your brain sends a message to your thumb and forefinger, saying, "Pick up the pencil." Your brain does not, of course, express that command in words, but sends a brain impulse based upon the kinaesthetic or motor image of the muscular action necessary to accomplish that act. But for our purpose in this ITS CAUSE AND CURE 79 experiment, we can assume that the brain sends the message in terms which, if interpreted in words, would be "pick up the pencil." Suppose that when that brain message reaches your thumb and forefinger, instead of reaching for the pen- cil, they immediately close and clap or stick, refusing to act. Your hand is unable to pick up the pencil. That, then, is similar to stammering. The hand is doing practically what the vocal organs do when the stammerer attempts to speak and fails. But, on the other hand, if, when the message was received by your thumb and finger, it made short, successive attempts to pick up the pencil, but failed to accomplish it, then you could compare that failure to the uncontrolled repeti- tions of stuttering. This inability to control the action of the thumb and forefinger would be the result of a lack of co-ordination between the brain and the muscles of the hand, while stutter- ing or stammering is the result of a lack of co-ordination between the brain and the muscles of speech. What Causes Lack of Co-ordination: But even after it is known that stuttering and stam- mering are caused by a lack of co-ordination 80 STAMMERING between the brain and the organs of speech, still, the mind of scientific and inquiring trend must ask, "What causes the lack of co-ordination?" And that question is quite in order. It is plain that the lack of co-ordination does not exist with- out a cause. What, then, is this cause ? An inquiry into the cause of the inco-ordina- tion between brain and speech-organs leads us to an examination of the original or basic causes of stammering. These original or basic causes in their various ramifications are almost as numer- ous as the cases of speech disorders themselves, but they fall into a comparatively few well- defined classes. These original causes in many cases do not appear to have been the direct and immediate cause of the trouble, but rather a predisposing cause or a cause which brought about a condition that later developed into stuttering or stam- mering. Let us set down a list of the more common of these causes, not with the expectation of having the list complete but rather of giving facts about the representative or more common Basic Predis- posing Causes of Stuttering and Stammering. A little more than 96 per cent, of the causes of ITS CAUSE AND CURE 81 stammering which the author has examined can be traced back to one of the five causes shown below: 1 Mimicry or Imitation 2 Fright or severe nerve shock 3 Fall or injury of some sort 4 Heredity 5 Disease Let us take up these familiar causes of stutter- ing or stammering in the order in which we have set them down and learn something more of them. The first and one of the most common causes is Mimicry, or, as it is probably more often called, Imitation. Mimicry or Imitation is almost wholly confined to children. After reaching the age of discretion, the adult is usually of sufficient intel- ligence to refrain from mimicking or imitating a person who stutters or stammers. The average small boy, however, (or girl, for that matter) seems to find delight in mocking and imitating a playmate who stutters or stammers, and so keen is this delight that he persists in this practice day after day until (as its own punish- 82 STAMMERING ment) the practice of mockery or mimicry brings upon the boy himself the affliction in which he found his fun. It may be noted, however, that Imitation is not always conscious, but often unconscious. The small child begins to imitate the stuttering com- panion without knowing that he engages in imita- tion. This practice, notwithstanding the fact that it is unconscious, soon develops into stuttering, without any cause being assignable by the parent until investigation develops that unconscious and even unnoticed imitation is the basic cause of the defective utterance. It has been definitely determined that stutter- ing may be communicable through contagious impressions, especially among children of tender age whose minds are subject to the slightest im- pressions. For this reason, it is not advisable for parents to allow children to play with others who stutter or stammer, nor is it charitable to allow a child who stutters or stammers to play with other children who are not so afflicted. So far-reaching are the effects of Imitation or Mimicry that in certain cases, children have been known to contract stuttering from associating ITS CAUSE AND CURE 83 with a deaf-mute whose expressions were made chiefly in the form of grunts and inarticulate sounds. Fright or Severe Nerve Shock: Another com- mon cause of stammering is fright or nervous shock, which may have been brought about in countless ways. One boy who came to me some time ago stated that he had swallowed a nail when about six years of age and that this was the cause of his stammering. The logical conclusion in a case like this would be that the nail had injured the vocal organs, but an examination proved that there was no organic defect and that the stam- mering was caused, not by injury directly to the vocal organs but by the nervous shock occasioned by swallowing the nail. Another case was that of a stammerer who re- ported that he had been given carbolic acid, by mistake, when a child and that he had stammered ever since. This, like the case of the boy who swallowed the nail, might be expected to prove a case of absolute physical injury or impairment of the vocal chords, but once again, it was clear that such was not the case and that the stammering was brought about solely from the nervous shock which came as a result of taking carbolic acid. 6 84 STAMMERING There is still another case of a boy who felt that he was continually being followed. This was of course merely a hallucination, but the fright that this boy's state of mind brought on soon caused him to stutter and stammer in a very pronounced manner. Fright is a prolific cause of stuttering in small children and may be traced in a great many cases to parents or nurses who persist in telling chil- dren stories of a frightful nature, or who, as a means of discipline, scare them by locking them up in the cellar, the closet or the garret. To these scare-tales told to children should be added the misguided practice of telling children that "the bogey-man will get you" or "the policeman is after you" or some such tale to enforce parental commands. An instance is recalled of a woman who created out of a morbid imagination a phan- tom of terrible mien, who abode in the garret and was constantly lying in wait for the small chil- dren of the household with the professed inten- tion of "eating them alive." Such disciplinary methods of parents savor much of the Inquisition and the Dark Ages and should, for the good of the children and the ITS CAUSE AND CURE 85 future generation they represent, be totally abol- ished. While these methods do not, in every case, result in stuttering or stammering, they make the child of a nervous disposition and lay him liable in later years to the afflictions which accompany nervous disorders. In some cases "tickling" a child has caused stammering or stuttering. Care should be exercised here as well, for prolonged tickling brings about intense muscular contrac- tion especially of the diaphragmatic muscles, which contraction is accompanied by an agitated mental condition as well as extreme nervousness, all of which approaches very closely to the com- bination of abnormal conditions which are found to be present in stammering or stuttering. Fall or Injury as a Cause: Step into any gathering of average American parents for a half -hour and if the subject of the children should come up, you are sure to hear one or more dramatic recitals of the falls and injuries suffered by the junior members of the household, from the first time that Johnny fell out of bed and fright- ened his mother nearly to death, to the day that he was in an automobile crash at the age of 23. 86 STAMMEKING And these tales are always closed with the pro- found bit of confided information that these falls are of no consequence "nothing ever comes of them." While in a great measure this is true, there are many falls and injuries suffered in childhood which are responsible for the ills of later life, although it is seldom indeed that they are blamed for the results which they bring about. Injuries and falls are a frequent cause of stut- tering and stammering. Usually, however, an injury results in stuttering or stammering, not because of any change in the physical structure brought about by the injury but rather by the nervous shock attending it. In other words, cases of stammering and stuttering caused apparently by injury might, if desired, be traced still further back, showing as the initial cause an injury but as a direct cause the fright or nervous shock re- sulting from that injury. A good example of this is found in a case of a young man who came to me some years ago. He said: "When I was about five years old, my brother and I were playing in the cellar and I wanted to jump off the top step. When I jumped, I hit my head on the cross-piece and it ITS CAUSE AND CUKE 87 knocked me back on the steps and I slid down on my back, and ever since, for ten years, I have stammered." Here is a case where the blow on the head, or the succession of blows on the spinal column as the boy slid down the stairs, might have been the cause of the trouble. More probably, it was the combined injury, undoubtedly resulting in a severe nervous shock from which the boy probably did not recover for many days. Another man said, in describing his case during an examination: "At the age of 16, 1 was hit on the head with a ball. I lost my memory for one week and when I regained it, I was a stammerer." This is a plain case of injury resulting in imme- diate stammering. Still another case is that of a boy who, at the age of three, was shot in the neck by a rifle, the bullet coming out of his chin, which resulted in his becoming an immediate stammerer. Here, as in the case of the boy who swallowed the nail, it might be expected that the cause was a defect in the organs of speech, but I found stammering was brought on by the nervous shock. From these few cases of actual occurrences, it will be seen that practically all cases of stammer- 88 STAMMERING ing caused by injury can be traced to the nervous shock brought about by the injury. Heredity as a Cause: There is little that need be said on the subject of heredity as a cause of stuttering and stammering, save that heredity is a common cause and that children of stuttering or stammering parents usually stammer. In this, as in the case of any malady hereditarily trans- mitted, it is difficult to say whether the trouble is caused by inheritance or by constant and intimate association of the child with his parents during the period of early speech development. The Result of Disease: Many cases of both stammering and stuttering may be traced back to disease as the basic or predisposing cause. Acute Chorea (St. Vitus Dance) is frequently the cause of stuttering of a type known as Choreatic Stut- tering or "Tic Speech." Infantile Cerebral Palsy sometimes brings about a condition known as "Spastic Speech," while whooping cough, scarlet fever, measles, meningitis, infantile paralysis, scrofula and rickets are sometimes responsible for the disorder. Disease may cause stuttering or stammering as ITS CAUSE AND CURE 89 an immediate after effect or the speech trouble may not show up for considerable time, depend- ing altogether upon the individual. But regard- less of the length of time clasping between the disease which predisposes the individual to the speech disorder and the time of the first evidence of its presence, diagnosis reveals but an insignifi- cant percentage of organic defects in these cases resulting from disease, indicating that even here the predominant causative factor is a mental one. CHAPTER III EACH individual case of stuttering or stam- mering has its own peculiarities, already more or less developed arising from structural differences (but not necessarily defects) in the organs of speech, as well as differences in tem- perament, health and nervousness; or peculiari- ties arising from habit which is the result of previous training or neglect, as the case may be. Sing Without Difficulty: Almost without exception, the stutterer or stammerer can sing without any difficulty, can talk to animals without stuttering or stammering, can talk when alone and in some cases can talk perfectly in a whisper. Some stammerers have less difficulty in talking to strangers than in talking to friends or relatives while in other cases, the condition is exactly re- versed. A stutterer or stammerer almost always experiences difficulty in speaking over the tele- phone. One experimenter has shown, however, ITS CAUSE AND CURE 91 that a stammerer can talk perfectly over the tele- phone so long as the receiver hook is depressed and there is no connection with another person at the other end of the line. This experimenter shows that immediately the receiver hook is released and a connection is established, the halt- ing, stumbling utterance begins. These peculiarities of stuttering and stammer- ing for many years puzzled investigators and were, in fact, finally responsible for arriving at the true cause of stammering. Almost every stammerer seeks for an explana- tion of these peculiar manifestations. Why is it, for instance, that a stammerer can sing without difficulty, although he cannot talk? This is one of the best evidences that could be produced to show that stammering is the result of a lack of mental control. The stammerer who can sing without difficulty has no organic or inherent defect in the vocal organs, that is sure. If the stammerer can sing, and if this proves that he has no organic defect, then it follows logically that the cause of his trouble is mental and not physical. Talk When Alone: The fact that a stammerer can talk without hesitation when alone and that 92 STAMMERING he can talk to animals may be explained by a very simple illustration any stammerer can try this experiment on one of his friends who does not stammer. He can prove that the reflex, or what might be termed subconscious movements of the bodily organs are more nearly normal than the same movements consciously controlled. Take, for instance, the regular beating of the pulse. Let anyone who does not stammer (it makes no difference in trying this experiment whether the person stammers or not, save that we are trying to prove that the condition may be brought about in one who is not a stammerer) feel his own pulse for sixty seconds. Let him be thoroughly conscious of this effort to learn the rapidity of its beating. If a disinterested observer could record the pulse as normally beat- ing and the pulse under the conscious influence of the mind, it would be found that the pulse under the conscious effort is beating either more rapidly or more slowly or that it is not beating as regularly as in the case of unconscious or reflex action. This same condition may be noticed in another unconscious or reflex action breathing. The ITS CAUSE AND CURE 93 moment you become conscious of an attempt to breathe regularly, breathing becomes difficult, re- stricted, irregular, whereas this same action, when unconscious, is thoroughly regular and even. In the average or normal person who has learned to talk correctly, speaking should be practically an unconscious process. It should not be necessary to make a conscious effort to form words, nor should a normal individual be con- scious of the energy necessary to create a word or the muscular movements necessary to its formation and expression. This will explain why the stutterer or stam- merer can talk without difficulty to animals or when alone there is no self-consciousness no conscious effort no thinking of what is being done. Another of the peculiarities of stammering is that the stammerer in many cases seems to be able to talk perfectly in concert. This has long baffled the investigator in this field, no reason being assignable for this ability to talk in con- nection with others. The baffling element has been this that the investigator has assumed that the stammerer talked well in concert, whereas a 94 STAMMERING very careful scientist would have discovered the stammerer to be a fraction of a second or a part of a syllable behind the others. You have doubtless been in church at some time when you were not entirely familiar with the hymn being sung, yet by lagging a note or two behind the rest, you could sing the song, to all appearances being right along with the others. When you talk over the long-distance tele- phone, the voice seems instantly to reach the party at the other end of the line, yet we know that a period of time has had to elapse to allow the voice waves to move along the telephone wire and reach the other end. The elapse of time has been too slight to be noted by the average human mind and the transmission seems instantaneous. This is what happens in the case of the stammerer who seems able to talk in concert he is merely a syllable or part of a syllable behind the rest, all the while giving the impression nevertheless, that he is talking just as they are. There are many other individual peculiarities which can be described by almost every stam- merer. These different peculiarities are more numerous than the cases of stammering and it would be useless to attempt to discuss them in ITS CAUSE AND CURE 95 detail. I will take up only two as being typical of dozens which have come under my observation in twenty-eight years' experience. One stammerer explains his difficulty as fol- lows: "I find I am unable to talk and do some- thing else at the same time. For instance, I have difficulty in talking while dancing, while at the table or while listening to music. If, for instance, I wish to talk to any one while the Victrola is being played, I unconsciously cut it off." This is a case where the stammerer finds that all of his faculties must be concentrated upon a supreme effort to speak before this becomes possible. In other words, he has not yet learned to control sufficiently the different parts of his body so that they may act independently. This might be termed a lack of independent co-ordination. In the case of another young man, he found himself unable to control the movements of his muscles. In describing his trouble, he said: "At one time, when I was talking particularly bad, I was out with some other fellows driving our car. I started to talk, found it almost impossible and noticed a sharp twitching of the muscles of face, arms and limbs. Try as I might, I found I could not control these movements and in another 96 STAMMERING minute I had steered the car into the ditch and wrecked it. And now," adds the young man, "although father has a new car, I am never allowed to drive it 1" Here was a case where the spasmodic action of the muscles had gotten so far beyond control as to make the ordinary pursuits of life dangerous to the young man who stammered. These spas- modic movements were always present he told of one occasion when he was in a barber's chair being shaved. He attempted to say a word or two while the barber was at work upon him, with the result that he lost control of the muscles of face and neck, causing the barber to cut a long gash in his neck. This was, of course, an abnormal case of spasmodic stammering, evidencing extraordinary muscular contractions of the worst type. In practically every case of stammering some such peculiarity is evident, resulting from the inabil- ity of the stammerer's brain to control physical actions. CHAPTER IV THE INTEBMITTENT TENDENCY PARADOXICAL as the statement may seem, it is nevertheless true that one of the symptoms of least seeming importance marks one of the most dangerous aspects of both stuttering and stammering. This is the alternating good-and-bad condition known as the Intermittent Tendency or the tendency of the stutterer or stammerer to show marked improvement at times. This seeming improvement brings about a feeling of relief, the unreasoning fear of failure seems for the time to have left almost entirely; the mental strain under which the sufferer ordi- narily labors seems to be no longer present; there is but little worry about either present condition or future prospects ; the nervous condition seems to have very materially improved, self-confidence returns quickly and with it the hope that the trouble is gone forever or is at least rapidly dis- appearing. With these manifestations of im- provement come also a greater ease in concen- 98 STAMMERING tration, a greater and more facile power-of-will and an ambition that shows signs of rekindling, with worth-while accomplishments in prospect. Hope now burns high in the breast of the stut- terer or stammerer. They go about smiling inwardly if not outwardly, happy as the proud father of a new boy, at peace with the world. The sun shines brighter than it has for months or years. Every one seems much more pleasant and agreeable. Things which the day before seemed totally impossible seem now to come within their range of accomplishment. Such is the feeling of the confirmed stutterer or stammerer during the time of this pseudo-freedom from his speech dis- order. In his own mind, the sufferer is quite sure that his malady has disappeared over-night, like a bad dream and that freedom of speech has been be- stowed upon him as a gift from the gods on high. The higher the hopes of the sufferer and the greater the assurance with which he pursues the activities of his day, the greater is his disappoint- ment and despair when the inevitable relapse overtakes him. For disappointment and despair are sure to conic just as sure as the sun is to rise in the ITS CAUSE AND CUBE heavens in the morning. The condition of relief is but temporary, and will soon pass away to be followed by a return of his old trouble in a form more aggravated than ever before. Fate seems to play with the stammerer's afflic- tion as a cat plays with a mouse, allowing him to be free for a few hours, a few days or a few weeks as the case may be, only to drag the dejected suf- ferer back to his former condition or, as is true in many cases, worse than before. The Recurrence: With the return of the trouble, the bodily and mental reaction are almost too great for the human mechanism to withstand. Hope seems to be a word which has been lost from the life of the stammerer. The fear of fail- ure returns with an overwhelming force mocking the sufferer with the thought of "Oh, how I deceived you!!"; the mental strain is exceedingly great so great, in fact, that it seems as if the breaking point has almost been reached. The nervous condition is alarming, the sufferer not- ing in himself an inability to work, to play, to study or even to sit still. An observer would note the stammerer or stutterer in this condition fingering his coat lapels, putting his hands in his 100 STAMMERING pockets and removing them again, biting his finger nails, constantly shifting eyes, head, arms and feet about. If at home, the sufferer in this condition would probably be seen walking about the house, unable to read, to play or listen to music or to follow any of the accustomed activi- ties of his life. If in business or in the shop, he would be noticed making frequent trips to the wash room, to the drinking fountain, to the fore- man, picking up and laying down his tools, look- ing out the window, shifting from one foot to another, all of which symptoms indicate an acute nervous condition, brought about by the return of his trouble. At this stage, the stammerer's confidence is hopelessly gone, so it seems, and this feeling is accompanied by one of depression which finds an outlet in the expression of the firm belief and con- viction on the part of the stutterer or stammerer that the disorder can NEVER be cured, by any method, although just the day before the same sufferer would have insisted that his stuttering or stammering had cured itself and left of its own accord. These conditions, both at the time of the so- called improvement and at the time of the recur- ITS CAUSE AND CURE 101 rence of the trouble, will appear in greater or less degree in the case of every stutterer or stammerer whose trouble is of the intermittent type. The Dangers of This Tendency: This period of recurrence is accompanied by almost total loss of the power-of-will, a marked weakening in the ability to concentrate, and if it does not result in insomnia (inability to sleep) puts the mind in such a state as to make sleep of little value in building up the body, replacing worn-out tissue cells and restoring vital energy. The chief danger, however, resulting from these periods of temporary improvement, is the belief that it instills into the mind of the suf- ferer and more frequently into the minds of the parents of stuttering or stammering children, that the trouble will cure itself a fallacy greater than which there is none. Stuttering and stammering are destructive maladies. They tear down both body and mind but they have not the slightest power to build up. And until a strong mental and physical structure has been built up in place of the weakened struc- ture (which results in stammering and stutter- ing) a cure is out of the question. CHAPTER V THE PROGRESSIVE TENDENCY rjlHE spell of intense recurrence of either JL stammering or stuttering which follows a period of improvement, often marks the period of transition from one stage of the disorder into the next and more serious stage. This transition, however, may not be a conscious process that is, the sufferer may not in any way be informed of the fact that he is passing into a more serious stage of his trouble save that after the transition has taken place, he may find himself a chronic or constant stammerer and in a nervous and mental condition much more acute than ever before. Dr. Alexander Melville Bell (father of Alex- ander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone), who, before his death, was a speech expert of unquestioned repute, discovered this condition many years ago and in his work Principles of Speech speaks of it as follows (page 234) : "Often the transition from simple to more complicated forme of difficulty is so rapid, that it cannot be traced or anticipated. Perhaps some slight ailment may imperceptibly ITS CAUSE AND CUKE 103 introduce the higher impediment or some evil example maj draw the ill-mastered utterance at once into the vortex cf the difficulty." This Progressive Tendency, which we shall here- after call the Progressive Character of the trouble in order to distinguish it from the Intermittent Tendency, is present in more than 98 per cent, of the cases of stammering and stuttering which I have examined and diagnosed. True, there are many cases, the apparent or manifest tendencies of which do not indicate that the disorder is becoming more serious, but never- theless this condition is no indication that the trouble is not busily at work tearing out the foundation of mental and bodily perfection. Successive Stages: Stuttering may be con- veniently divided into four stages, by which its progress may be measured. These may be desig- nated in their order as : 1 Simple Phase 2 Advanced Phase 3 Mental Phase 4 Compound Phase The progress of the disorder is sure. Take the case of a child eight years of age who has a case 104 STAMMEEING of simple stuttering. Permit the child to go without attention for some time and the trouble will have progressed into the Advanced Phase, usually without the knowledge of the child or his parents or without any especially noticeable sur- face change in his condition. Stuttering in its first phase Simple Stutter- ing can justly be called a physical and not a mental trouble. In this stage, the disorder should be easily eradicated. The duration of cases of Simple Stuttering is very slight, for the reason that Simple Stuttering soon passes into the Ad- vanced Phase, which is of a physical-mental nature, exhibiting the symptoms of a mental dis- turbance as well as of a physical difficulty. From the Advanced Phase stuttering then passes into the Mental Phase, where the mental strain is found to be greatly intensified and the disorder a distinct mental type instead of a phys- ical or physical-mental trouble. When stuttering in this stage is permitted to continue its hold upon the sufferer, the continued strain, worry and fear bring about a condition of extraordinary malignancy, in which the trouble develops into the Chronic Mental Stage. This is a condition bordering upon mental breakdown ITS CAUSE AND CURE 105 and even though the complete breakdown never occurs, the one afflicted finds himself a chronic stutterer, without surcease from his trouble. He further finds that he has increasing difficulty in thinking of the things which he wishes to say. He seems to know, but his mind refuses to frame the thought. In other words, he is unable to recall the mental image of the word in mind, and is therefore unable to speak the word. This is a condition known as Aphasia or Thought Lapse and represents a most serious stage of the diffi- culty, in many cases totally beyond the possibil- ity of relief a condition in which no stutterer should allow himself to get. Stammering, being a kindred condition to stut- tering, progresses from bad to worse in a manner very similar. The progress of stammering may be classified into successive stages as follows : 1 Elementary Stage 2 Spasmodic Stage 3 Primary Mental Stage 4 Chronic Mental Stage 5 Compound Stage Stammering in the Elementary Stage, like Stut- tering, is a Physical Trouble. The Stammerer has often been known to remain in the Elemen- 106 STAMMERING tary Stage only a few days or a few weeks, pass- ing almost immediately into either the Spasmodic or the Primary Mental Stage. Not all stam- merers pass into the Spasmodic Stage of the disorder, however, some passing directly into Primary Mental Stage. The Spasmodic Stage, however, is a form of difficulty somewhat akin to the Advanced Phase of Stuttering, for in this stage the trouble can be said to be of Physical-Mental nature instead of the purely physical disorder found in Elemen- tary Stammering. Stammering, in the Primary Mental Stage, takes on a distinct Mental form as differentiated from the Mental-Physical form and becomes therefore more difficult to eradicate. If allowed to continue, this form of Stammering (like Stut- tering) passes into the Chronic Mental Stage, in which case the Stammerer usually exhibits pro- nounced signs of Thought Lapse and finds him- self a Chronic or Constant Stammerer, often unable to utter a sound and further at times unable to think of what he wishes to say. The progress of both Stuttering and Stam- mering from one stage to another is very certain. These speech disorders do not differ materially ITS CAUSE AND CUKE 107 from other human afflictions in this respect they do not remain constant. There is an axiom in Nature, that "Nothing is static," which, being in- terpreted, means, that nothing stands still. And this applies with full force to the stutterer or stammerer. If no steps are taken to remedy the malady, he may be very sure that the disorder is getting worse not standing still or remaining the same. CHAPTER VI CAN STAMMERING AND STUTTERING BE OUTGROWN? PROBABLY the most harmful and oft- repeated bit of advice ever given to a stam- merer or stutterer is that which says, "Oh, don't bother about it you will soon outgrow the trou- ble!" It is the most harmful because it is palp- ably untrue. It is so oft-repeated because the person giving the advice knows nothing what- ever about the cause of stammering and just as little about its progress or treatment. The fact that we hear of no cases of stuttering or stammering which have been outgrown does not seem to alter the popular and totally un- founded belief that stammering and stuttering can be readily outgrown. If the reader has not read the chapter on the causes of stuttering and stammering and the two preceding chapters on the Intermittent Tendency and the Progressive Character of these speech disorders, then these chapters should be read care- fully before going further with this one, because ITS CAUSE AND CUBE 109 it is essential to know the cause of the trouble before it is possible to answer intelligently the question, "Can Stammering be Outgrown?" To any one who understands the nature of the difficulty and the progress it is liable to make, the question is almost as absurd as asking whether or not the desire to sleep can be outgrown by stay- ing awake. But aside from its scientific aspect aside from the absurdity of the question let us examine the facts as revealed by actual records of cases. Let us dispense with all theory on the sub- ject and take experience gained in a wide range of cases as the correct guide in rinding the answer. Facts from Statistics: An examination of the records of several thousand cases of stuttering and stammering of all types and in all stages of development reveals the fact that after passing the age of six, only one-fifth of one per cent, ever outgrow stammering. This means that out of every five hundred people who stammer, only one ever outgrows it. Between the ages of three and ix, the indications are more favorable, the rec- ords in these cases showing that slightly less than one per cent, outgrow the difficulty. That means 110 STAMMERING that one out of every hundred children affected has a chance, at least, of outgrowing the difficulty between the ages of three and six, and after that time, only one chance in five hundred. Suppose you were handed a rifle, given five hundred cartridges and told to hit a bull's eye at a hundred yards, 499 times out of 500. Suppose you were told that if you missed once you would have to suffer the rest of your life as a stammerer. Would you take the offer? Certainly not!!! And yet that is exactly the opportunity that a stammerer over six years of age has to outgrow his trouble. Dr. Leonard Keene Hirschberg, the medical writer, whose suggestions appear daily in a large list of newspapers, has this to say about the pos- sibility of outgrowing stammering: "Often when the attention of careless and reckless fa- talistic relatives is attracted to a child's stammering, they labor nnder the mistaken illusion that the child 'will out- grow it.' A more harmful doctrine has never been perpet- uated than the one contained in that stock phrase. As a matter of experience, speech troubles are not 'outgrown.' They become 'ingrown.' If not corrected at first they go from bad to worse. So firmly rooted and ingrained into the child's habits does stuttering become that with every hour's growth the chance for a cure becomes farther and farther removed." This statement from Dr. Hirschberg is a ITS CAUSE AND CURE 111 straight-forward, practical and common-sense view of the subject. The belief that the child will outgrow the malady often springs out of the tendency of the stammerer to be better and worse by turns, a condition which is fully described and explained in the chapter on the Intermittent Tendency. There is always present in any case of stammer- ing the opportunity for a cessation of the trouble for a short period of time. The visible condition is changeable and it is this particular aspect of the disorder that renders it deceptive and danger- ous, for many, who find themselves talking fairly well for a short period, believe that they are on the road to relief, whereas they are simply in a position where their trouble is about to return upon them in greater force than ever. From the nature of the impediment lack of co-ordination between the brain and the organs of speech stammering cannot be outgrown no more so than the desire to eat or to talk or to sleep. Back of that statement, there is a very sound scientific reason that explains why stammering cannot be outgrown. Stammering is destructive. It tears down but cannot build up. Every time 112 STAMMERING the stammerer attempts to speak and fails, the failure tears out a certain amount of his power- of-will. And since it is impossible for him to speak fluently except on rare occasions, this loss of will-power and confidence takes place every time he attempts to speak, so that with each suc- cessive failure, his power to speak correctly be- comes steadily lessened. The case of a stammerer might be compared to a road in which a deep rut has been worn. Each time a wagon passes through this rut, it becomes deeper. The stam- merer has no more chance of outgrowing his trouble than the road has of outgrowing the rut. Dr. Alexander Melville Bell recognizes the ab- solute certainty of the progress of stammering and the impossibility of outgrowing the difficulty, when he states in his work, Principles of Speech (page 234) : "If the stammerer or stutterer were brought under treat- ment before the spasmodic habit became established, his cure would be much easier than after the malady has become rooted in his muscular and nervous system." To the stammerer or stutterer or the parents of a stammering child, experience brings no truer lesson than this: Stammering cannot be out- grown ; danger lurks behind delay. CHAPTER VII THE EFFECT ON THE MIND IT is hardly necessary to describe to the stam- merer who has passed beyond the first stage of his trouble the effect of stammering on the mind. Most any sufferer in the second or third stages of the malady has experienced for very brief periods the sensation of thoughts slipping away from him and of pursuing or attempting to pursue those thoughts for some seconds without success, finally to find them returning like a flash. The stammerer who recalls such an incident will remember the f eelings of lassitude or momen- tary physical exhaustion, as well as the feeling of weakness which followed the lapse-of-thought. This mental flurry is but an indication of a men- tal condition known as Thought-Lapse, which may result from long-continued stammering, especially a case which has been allowed to pro- gress into the Chronic or Advanced Stage. A Case of Aphasia: One writer, in citing in- stances of thought-lapse, or aphasia, tells of the 114 STAMMERING case of a man unable to recall the name of any object until it was repeated for him. A knife, for instance, placed on the table before him, brought no mental image of the word represent- ing the object, yet if the word "knife" were spoken for him, he would immediately say, "Oh, yes, it is a knife." A chapter could be filled with instances of this sort, but I shall not attempt to quote further any of the symptoms of aphasia in a stammerer, for in cases that become so far advanced, there is con- siderable question as to the possibility of bringing about a cure. I say this, notwithstanding the fact that my experience with students having this tendency has been very satisfactory indeed. Cases of unreasoning despondency, which re- sult in the stammerer's desire to take his own life, are so numerous as hardly to require comment. Very frequently you see in some of the large metropolitan papers an account of a suicide resulting from a nervous and mental condition brought on by stuttering and stammering. This condition seems to be very marked in the cases of stammerers between the ages of twelve and twenty, records showing that most of the suicides of stammerers are persons between those ages. ITS CAUSE AND CURE 115 The intense mental strain, the extreme nervous condition, the continual worry and fear cannot fail, sooner or later, to have its effect upon the mind. This is clear to any stammerer, who is familiar with the mental condition brought about by the first few hours of one of his periods of re- currence. Another case where the mental strain is extremely great is that of the synonym stam- merer the mentally alert individual who, in order to prevent the outward appearance of stammering, is continually searching for syno- nyms or less difficult words to take the place of those which he cannot speak. This continual searching for synonyms results in a nervous ten- sion that is sure to tell on the mental faculties sooner or later, and I have found, in examining many thousands of cases, that the synonym stam- merer is usually in a more highly nervous state than any other type. Mental Strain Eventually Tells: The effect of stuttering or stammering on the sufferer's con- centration is very marked. The sufferer notes an inability to concentrate his mind on any sub- ject for any length of time, finds it impossible to pursue an education with any degree of success 116 STAMMERING or to follow any business which requires close attention and careful work. The power-of-will is also affected and the stammerer notes an inability to put through the things which he starts and which require the exer- cise of will power to bring to a successful con- clusion. A diagnosis of insanity is sometimes made in the case of a stammerer in the advanced stages of his malady, while in other instances the mental aberration takes the form of a hallucination of some sort, as in the case of the boy who was of the belief that he was continually being followed. But regardless of what form is taken by the mental disorder resulting from stammering, such cases are almost invariably found to have long since passed into the incurable stage, although positive statements as to the individual's condi- tion should not be made, as a rule, without a thorough diagnosis having first been made. CHAPTER VIII THE EFFECTS ON THE BODY effect of stammering or stuttering J_ upon the physical structure is problemat- ical. In some cases examined, a noticeable lack of vitality has been found, together with an almost total loss of active appetite, a marked inclination toward insomnia and a generally debilitated con- dition resulting from the nervous strain and con- tinued fear brought on by the speech disorder. In other cases, it has been found that the health was but little affected and that there was no marked departure from normal. The physical condition of the stammerer is the result of many factors. If plenty of fresh air and exercise is supplied, and the mind is well- employed so that the worry over the trouble does not disturb the stammerer, then the chances for being in a normal physical condition are good. On the other hand, the boy of studious dis- position, who is somewhat of a bookworm, keeps close to the house and does not play with other children of his age, will probably find time for 118 STAMMEBING much introspection, and on this account, as well as on account of the lack of fresh air and exer- cise, will probably be in a physical condition that of itself demands careful attention. It has been found in examinations of stammer- ers and stutterers, however, that they are usually of below normal chest expansion and that the health, while not particularly bad, is subject to a great improvement as a result of the proper treatment for stammering. Charles Kingsley, the noted English divine and writer, and himself a stammerer many years ago, has the following to say regarding the effect of stammering on the body: "Continual depres- sion of spirit wears out body as well as mind. The lungs never act rightly, never oxygenate the blood sufficiently. The vital energy continually directed to the organs of speech and there used up in the miserable spasm of mis-articulation cannot feed the rest of the body ; and the man too often becomes thin, pale, flaccid, with contracted chest, loose ribs and bad digestion. I have seen a boy of twelve stunted, thin as a ghost and with every sign of approaching consumption. I have seen that boy a few months after being cured, ITS CAUSE AND CUBE 119 upright, ruddy, stout, eating heartily and begin- ning to grow faster than he had ever grown in his life. I never knew a single case in which the health did not begin to improve then and there." CHAPTER IX DEFECTIVE SPEECH IN CHILDREN (1) The Pre-Speaking Period FROM the standpoint of speech development, the life of any person between the time of birth and the age of twenty-one years, may be divided into four periods as follows: From Birth to Age 2 Pre-Speaking Period. Age 2 to Age 6 Formative-Setting Period Age 6 to Age 11 Speech-Setting Period Age 11 to Age 20 Adolescent Period This chapter will deal only with the first period of tiie child's speech-development, beginning with birth and taking the child up to his second year. The speech disorders of the later periods will be taken up in the three following chapters. The Pre-Speaking Period: This is the period between the time of birth and the age of 2, and ITS CAUSE AND CURE 121 takes the child up to the time of the first spoken word. This does not mean, of course, that no child speaks before the age of 2, for many chil- dren have made their first trials at speaking at as early an age as 15 months, and many begin to talk by the time they are a year and a half old. At the age of two, however, not only the pre- cocious child but the child of slower-than-averagc development should be able to talk in at least brief, disjointed monosyllables. Before taking up the possibility of a child ex- hibiting symptoms of defective speech with the first utterance, let us familiarize ourselves with the fundamentals underlying the production of the first spoken words. The mother, who for months, perhaps, has been listening with eager interest and fond anticipa- tion for her child's first word to be spoken, has little comprehension of the vast amount of edu- cation and training which the infant has absorbed in order to perfect this first small utterance. Months have been spent in listening to others, in taking in sounds and recalling them, in impress- ing them upon the memory by constant repeti- tion, until finally after a year and a half, or more, 122 STAMMERING perhaps, the circuit is completed and the first word is put down as history. Association of Ideas: It must be remembered that perfect co-ordination of speech is the result of many mental images, not of one. In saying the word "salt," for instance, you have a graphic mental picture of what salt looks like; a second picture of what the word sounds like; a "motor- memory" picture of the successive muscle move- ments necessary to the formation of the word; another picture that recalls the taste of salt, and still another that recalls the movements of the hand necessary to write the word. These pictures all hinging upon the word "salt" were gradually acquired from the time you began to observe. You tasted salt. You saw it at the same time you tasted it. There you see was an association of two ideas. Thereafter, when you saw salt, you not only recognized it by sight, but your brain recalled the taste of salt, without the necessity of your really tasting it. Or, on the other hand, if you had shut your eyes and someone had put salt on your tongue, the taste in that case would have recalled to your ITS CAUSE AND CURE 123 mind the graphic picture of the appearance of salt. As you grew older and learned to speak, your vocal organs imitated the sound of the word "salt" as you heard it expressed by others and thus you learned to speak that word. At that stage, your brain was capable of calling up three mental pictures an auditory picture, or a pic- ture of the sound of the word ; a graphic or visual picture, or a picture of the appearance of salt, and a third, which we have called a motor- memory picture, which represents the muscular movements necessary to speak the word. A little later on, after you had gone to school and learned to write, you added to these pictures a fourth, the movements of the hand necessary to write the word "salt." At the sight of the mother, a child may, for instance, be heard to say the word "Mom" while at the sight of the pet dog whose name is "Dot," be heard to say "Dot" in his ehildish way. Here we have the first example in this child of the association of ideas. The child has heard, re- peatedly, the word "Mama" used in conjunction with the appearance of the smiling face of his 124 STAMMERING mother. Thus has the child acquired the habit of associating the word "Mama" with that face and the sight of the countenance after a time recalls the sound of the associated word. Thus a visual image of the mother transmitted to the child through the medium of the eye, links up a train of thought that finally results in the child's attempt to say "Mama." To take another example of the association of ideas or the co-ordination of mental images neces- sary to the production of speech, let us suppose, for instance, that the child has been in the habit of petting the dog and hearing him called by name "Dot" at the same time. Now, if the dog be placed out of the child's sight and yet in a posi- tion where the hand of the child can reach and pet him in a familiar way, this sense of touch, like the sense of sight, will set up a train of thought that results in the child making his childish attempt to speak the name of the dog "Dot." In other words the excitation of any sensory organs sets up a series of sensory impulses which are transmitted along the sensory nerve fibres to the brain, where they are referred to the cerebel- lum or filing case, locating a set of associated im- ITS CAUSE AND CURE 125 pulses which travel outward from the motor area of the brain and result in the actions, or series of actions, which are necessary to produce a word. It will make the action of the brain clearer if the reader will remember the sensory nerve fibres as those carrying messages only TO the brain, while the motor nerve fibres carry messages only FKOM the brain. To make still clearer this association of ideas so necessary to the production of speech, suppose this same child hears the word "Dot" spoken in his presence. He will, in all probability, begin to repeat the word, and to search diligently for his pet dog. Thus it will be seen that in this case the sound of the dog's name has stirred up a train of mental images, one of these being a visual image of the dog himself, causing the child to look about in search for him. Hoio We Learn to Talk: We learn to talk, therefore, purely by observation and imitation. Observation is here used in a broad sense and means not only seeing but sensing, such as sens- ing by smelling, touching or tasting. The child imitates the sounds he hears and if these sounds 126 STAMMERING emanate from those afflicted with defective utter- ance, then it follows that the initial utterance of the child will be likewise defective. Source of the First Word: The first spoken word of the child usually finds its source in some name or word repeatedly spoken in the child's presence. It is not usual that this first word is marked by a defective utterance and if such should be the case, then it is safe to say that this faulty utterance can be traced back to the imita- tion of some member of the family, or some child who has been permitted to talk to the child in his pre-speaking period. There is little to be gained by tracing the first word back, for no very pro- found conclusion can safely be registered with such a basis, for no matter what the word be and no matter whether it be correctly or imperfectly enunciated, it is the result of imitation. There may be two exceptions to this, however, one being the case of a child with a physical de- fect in the organs of speech and the other that of a child who has inherited from the parents a pre- disposition to stammer or stutter. These excep- tions, however, are so rare as to hardly require consideration. In the first (that of a physical ITS CAUSE AND CUEE 127 defect) it is hardly probable that an organic de- fect would manifest itself in the form of stutter- ing or stammering, but rather in some other form of defective utterance. In the case of the in- herited predisposition to stutter or stammer, there is always the question which has contributed more largely to the defective utterance the inherited predisposition or the association with others wfio speak in a faulty manner. Advice to Parents: It is very essential that from the very beginning of the period of the recording of suggestion, the child is shown the correct and customary utterance with the best method of its accomplishment. The child should not be subjected to constant repetitions of pho- netic defects, imperfect utterance or speech dis- orders of any sort. The child who hears none but perfect speech is not liable to speak imperfectly, or at least not so liable as the child who hears wrong methods of talking in use at all times, for this last cannot escape the effects of his environ- ment. CHAPTER X DEFECTIVE SPEECH IN CHILDREN (8) The Formative Period ri iHE period in a child's speech development JL dating from the second year and up to the sixth, is called the Formative Period, for the reason that this is the time when the child is husy learning new words, acquiring new habits of speech, co-ordinating and learning properly to associate the flood of ideas which overwhelm the child-mind in this period. The child-vocabulary at this time is but an echo of the vocabulary of the home. The words that have been used most frequently there are most strongly impressed upon the child-mind. The names he has heard, the objects he has seen, the applications of speech-ideas these alone are now in his mind. This condition is inevitable since the child must learn to speak by imitation and, since he has had no source of word-pictures other than the home, he must have acquired facility in ITS CAUSE AND CURE 129 the use of only those words he has had an oppor- tunity to hear. Former President Wilson, whose faultless dic- tion, remarkable fluency of expression and dis- criminating choice of words, made him a master speaker and writer, attributed his facility to the training he received in the home of his father, a minister, where the children were constantly encouraged in the use of correct English and in the broadening and enrichment of their store of words. From the form of simple child-speech, made up often of monosyllables or of a few brief and easy sentences, the child must now evolve a more complicated form of thought-expression, with the use of connectives, descriptions and a finer gradation of color than heretofore. This process may be materially aided by the parent by the repetition of the child's own utter- ances, proving to the child that these are correct, that he is being understood and giving him con- fidence to venture further out in his attempts at speech amplification. This encouragement of the child-mind in its attempts to speak is so impor- tant that it is worth while to give some simple 130 STAMMERING examples of what is meant, in order that the point may be clearly understood. Let us take, first, the example of a mother who, from some cause, allows herself to be of a nervous and irrita- ble disposition. The small child may say, "Mam- ma, I want a tooky." The mother, either through indifference or through habit, says, "You want what?" This, first of all, is like a dash of cold water to the child in his uncertain state of mind as to the correctness of his utterance. The child repeats, "I want a tooky," and in all probability gets the further inquiry, "You want a tooky what's that?" which undermines the child's confi- dence in himself and in his ability to talk. On the other hand, the mother who under- stands the needs of the child from a speech-form- ing standpoint will not insist on the child repeat- ing the word time after time as if it was not understood. She will strive hard to understand the first time, even though the expression is im- perfect and difficult of interpretation, and her nimble mind having figured out what it is that the child desires, will say, "Baby wants a cooky?" Here the child, in his comparatively new occupa- tion of talking, finds a deal of delight in knowing ITS CAUSE AND CURE 131 that his words have been properly comprehended and feels a new confidence in his ability to express thoughts which confidence, by the way, is essen- tial to normal speech development in the child. It has the further effect of correcting the tend- ency of faulty utterance, and in time will result in the complete eradication of the natural tendency to "baby-talk" which is too often en- couraged and aided by the habit of parents in repeating the baby-talk. In no case, should de- fective utterances be repeated, no matter how "cute" the utterance may seem at the time. Many speak indistinctly throughout their entire life simply because of the habit of their parents in repeating baby-talk, thus confirming incorrect images of numerous words. Speech Disorders in the Formative Period: The Formative Period may mark the beginning of a speech disorder and in many instances chronic cases of stuttering and stammering may be traced to a simple disorder which first mani- fested itself in the ages between 2 and 6. Speech disorders arising in this period may be traced to any one of a number of causes. In a 132 STAMMERING child of five, for instance, the diagnostician would look for evidences of an inherited tendency to stammer or stutter; he would look also for cir- cumstances which would show that the child had acquired defective utterance through mimicry of others similarly afflicted or through the uncon- scious imitation of the defective speech of those immediately about him. Failing to find any hereditary tendency to a speech defect or any evidence that the disorder had been acquired by imitation or mimicry, the next step would be to determine whether or not the trouble had been caused by disease or injury. As explained in Chapter III, the diseases of childhood, such as Whooping Cough, Scarlet Fever, Diphtheria, Acute Chorea, Infantile Cerebral Palsy and Infantile Paralysis are fre- quently the cause of stuttering or stammering, and a history showing a record of these diseases would result in a very careful examination for the purpose of determining if they had resulted in a form of defective utterance. Advice to Parents: But whatever the cause of the trouble, care should be taken to see that it grows no worse and every attempt should be ITS CAUSE AND CURE 133 made to eradicate it at this early stage. Like a fire, speech disorders in their early stages are insignificant compared to their future progress and can be much more readily eradicated then than later. Inasmuch as a child of less than eight years is hardly old enough to undertake institu- tional treatment successfully, it behooves the parent of the stammering or stuttering child to render what home assistance is possible, during this period. The old adage, tried and true, that "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" is never more correctly applied than here. A few simple suggestions may aid in preventing the trouble from progressing rapidly to a serious stage, even though these suggestions do not erad- icate the disorder altogether. First of all, the child should be kept in the very best possible physical condition. This means, too, plenty of fresh air and sunshine, without which any child is less than physically fit. It is important that the child be not allowed to associate with others who stammer or stutter, or who have any form of speech disorder. Imita- tion or mimicry, as heretofore stated, is the most prolific cause of speech trouble and to place a child who stammers or stutters in the company 134 STAMMERING of an older person similarly afflicted, is to invite a serious form of the disorder. Nervousness, while not the cause of speech dis- order, is an aggravant of the trouble and should be avoided. The child should not be allowed to engage in anything which has a tendency to make him nervous or highly excited. Such a condition will aggravate the speech trouble, make it worse and tend to fix it more firmly in the child. Furthermore, parents should not scold or be- rate the child because he stammers or stutters. No child stammers or stutters because he wants to, but because he has not the power to control his speech organs. In other words, the child can- not help himself and scolding and harsh words simply cause confusion and dejection which in turn react to make a more serious condition. The Chances for Outgrowing: The author's examination and diagnosis of more than 20,000 cases of speech disorders has revealed the fact that at this period in the life of the child afflicted with stammering or stuttering, slightly less than 1 per cent, outgrow the difficulty. With proper parental care it might be possible to increase this percentage, perhaps double it, but this should ITS CAUSE AND CURE 135 hardly be called "outgrowing." In the mind of the average person, the expression "outgrowing his stammering" means that the stammerer has been able to go ahead without giving the slightest heed to his trouble and that it has, by some magical process, ceased to exist. This is a fal- lacy. Stammering and stuttering are both de- structive and progressive and no amount of indifference will result in relief but on the other hand, will terminate in a more malignant type of the disorder. It is true, however, that more care on the part of the parent in looking after the formation of speech habits in the Pre- Speaking and Formative Periods of the child's speech de- velopment, would result in fewer cases of chronic stammering and stuttering in later life. CHAPTER XI DEFECTIVE SPEECH IN CHILDREN (3) The Speech-Setting Period rriHE period from the age of 6 to the age of JL 11 (inclusive) is in truth the Speech-Setting Period, for it is at this time that the child's speech habits become more or less fixed, and his vocabu- lary, while constantly developing, manifests tend- encies which may be traced through into the later life of the adult. This Speech-Setting Period marks two very important events in the speech development of the child. First, it marks the period of second dentition or the time when the milk-teeth are "shed" and the new and permanent teeth take their place. This is a critical period and statistics show that there is a marked increase in speech disorders at this time. The second event of im- portance, both to child and to parents, is the beginning of the work in school. It must be remembered that heretofore the child has been under the watchful care of the parents during most of his hours, while now, with the beginning ITS CAUSE AND CURE 137 of his work in school, he is having his first small taste of facing the world alone even if only for a little while each day. Regardless of the attitude which the child takes toward his work in school, this work presents new problems and new possibilities of danger from a standpoint of speech development. A slight de- fect in utterance which at home is passed over from long familiarity, is the subject of ridicule and laughter at school. For the first time in the child-life, the stammering or stuttering young- ster may experience the awful feeling of being laughed at and made fun of, without exactly knowing why. He will have to face the ques- tions of his thoughtless companions who will at- tempt to make him talk merely for the sake of entertaining themselves. To the child who stut- ters or stammers, this is torture in its worst form. The humiliation and disgrace which the stammer- ing child must undergo on the way to school, in the school-yard and on the way home again, is a tremendous force in the life of the youngster a force which may seriously impede his mental de- velopment, his physical welfare and his progress in school. He finds himself unlike others, de- ficient in some respect and yet not realizing the 138 STAMMERING exact nature of his deficiency or understanding why it should be a deficiency. He stands up to recite with a constantly increasing fear of failure in his heart and unless he is fortunate enough to have a teacher who understands, is apt to fare poorly at her hands, also. Even in the case of the teacher who does understand the child's difficulty and consequently permits written instead of oral recitations, there is a constant feeling of inability on the part of the child, a knowledge of being less-whole than those about him, which saps the self-confidence so necessary to proper mental de- velopment and normal progress. He further- more misses much of the value of the studies that he pursues, for, as a noted educator has said, "In order for a child to remember and fix clearly in his own mind the things he studies, those things must be repeated in oral recitation." And this the stammering or stuttering child cannot do. Sending Stammering Children to School: With these facts in mind, the question arises as to whether it is ever policy to send a stammering or stuttering child to school, knowing that he is afflicted with a speech-disorder. In the first place the parents who send a stammering child to ITS CAUSE AND CURE 139 school exhibit a careless disregard for the rights of others and a further disregard for the many children who must, of a necessity, associate with this stammering child, with all the consequent dangers of infection by imitation or mimicry. Speech defects of a remediable nature among school children could be materially reduced by refusing to allow children so afflicted to play or in any way associate with the others who talk normally. Aside, however, from the question of the par- ents' obligation to society and to the children of others (which should be, in the end, a means of protection for their own children, as well) there is the bigger and more selfish aspect of the ques- tion, viz. : the effect on the child himself. No better suggestion can be given than that contained in "The Habit of Success" by Luther H. Gulick, who says : "If you take a child that is really mentally subnormal and put him in school with normal children, he cannot do well no matter how hard he tries. He tries again and again and fails. Then he is scolded and punished, kept after school and held up to the ridicule of the teacher and other students. When he goes out on the playground, he cannot play with the vigor and skill and force of other children. In the plays, he is not wanted on either side ; he is always ' it ' in tag. So 140 STAMMERING he soon acquires the presentment that he is going to fail no matter what he does, that he cannot do as the others do and that there is no use in trying. So he gives up trying. He quits. "That is the largest element in the lives of the feeble- minded that conviction that they cannot do like others, and is the first thing they must overcome if they are to be helped. There is no hope whatever of growth, as long as they foresee they are going to fail." The futility of trying to "cram" an education into a subnormal child has never been better expressed than in the statement quoted above. There is nothing to be gained by insisting that a child who is ill, attend school and it should be remembered that so far as school is concerned, the child who stutters or stammers is just as ill as the one with the measles, save that the illness of the stammering or stuttering child is chronic and persistent, while that of the other is temporary. Chances for Outgrowing at This Age: The opportunities for the stammering or stuttering child to outgrow his trouble are about five times as great in the Formative Period, between the ages of 2 and 6, as they are in the Speech- Set ting Period, from 6 to 11. In the former, as previ- ously explained, statistics show that about 1 per cent. or one in a hundred outgrow their trou- ITS CAUSE AND CURE 141 ble before the age of 6, while after this age the percentage drops to one-fifth of one per cent, or about one person in every five hundred, which is a very small chance indeed. In speaking of the tendency of parents to wait in the hope that speech disorders will be out- grown, Walter B. Swift, A. B., S. B., M. D., has this to say: "This suggestion may frequently be offered, even by the physician. Many people say, 'Let the case alone and it will outgrow its defect.' No treatment could be more foolish than this. No advice could be more ill-advised; no sugges- tion could show more ignorance of the problems of speech. Such advisers are ignorant of the harm they are doing and the amount of mental drill of which they are depriving the pupil. Nor do they know at all whether or not the case will ever ' outgrow ' its defect. In brief, this advice is without foundation, without scientific backing, and should never be followed." Advice to Parents: Parents of children be- tween the ages of 6 and 11 who stammer or stut- ter, should follow out the suggestions given in the previous chapter, with the idea of removing the difficulty in its incipiency if possible, or at least of preventing its progress. If by the time the child is eight years of age, the defective utterance remains, this fact is proof that the speech dis- order is of a form that will not yield to the simple 142 STAMMERING methods possible under parental treatment at home and the child should be immediately placed under the care of an expert whose previous knowledge and experience insures his ability to correct the defective utterance quickly and per- manently. In all cases after the age of 8, the matter should be taken firmly in hand. There should be no dilly-dallying, no foolish belief in the possibility of outgrowing the trouble, for whatever chances once existed are now past. First of all, the child's case should be diagnosed by an expert with the idea of ascertaining the exact nature of the speech disorder, the probable progress of the trouble, the present condition, the curability of the case and the possibilities for early relief. A personal diagnosis should be secured where possible, but when this cannot be brought about, a written description and history of the case should enable the capable diagnostician of speech defects to diagnose the case in a very thorough manner. The result of this diagnosis should be set down in the form of a report in order that the parent may have a permanent record of the child's con- dition and may be able to take the proper steps for the eradication of the speech disorder. With ITS CAUSE AND CURE 143 this information as to the child's case in hand, parents should be guided by the advice of Alex- ander Melville Bell, one of the greatest speech specialists of his age, who said: "Stuttering and Hesitation are stages through which the stammerer generally passes before he reaches the climax of his difficulty, and if he were brought under treatment before the spasmodic habit became established, his cure would be much more easy than after the malady has become rooted in his muscular and nervous system." Truly may it be said of the stammering child at this period, that "There is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood, leads on to for- tune ; omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries." CHAPTER XII THE SPEECH DISORDERS OF YOUTH OUTH, as we shall define it from the stand- JL point of the development of speech disorders, is the period from the age of 12 to the age of 20. From the twelfth to the twentieth year is a very critical period in the life of both the boy and the girl who stammers a period which should have the watchfulness and care of the parent at every step. This is known as the period of adolescence and may be said to mark the time of a new birth, when both mind and body undergo vital changes. New sensations, many of them intense, arise, and new associations in the sense sphere are formed. To the boy or girl passing through this stage of life, it is a period of new and unknown forces, emotions and feelings. It is a time of uncer- tainty. The sure-footed confidence of childhood gives way to the unsure, hesitating, questioning attitude of a mind filled with new and strange thoughts and a body animated by new and strange sensations. These are the symptoms of a fundamental ITS CAUSE AND CUBE 145 change, the outward manifestations of the pass- ing from childhood to manhood or womanhood. This is childhood's equinoctial storm, marking the beginning of the second season of life's year. In this storm, it is the paramount duty of the parent to be a safe and ever-present pilot through the sea that to the captain of this craft is as uncharted as the route to the Indies in Columbus' day. The revolution now taking place in both the mental and bodily processes results in a lack of stability an "unsettledness" that manifests itself in restlessness, nervousness, self -consciousness or morbidness, taking perhaps the form of a per- sistent melancholia or desire to be alone. At this time in the life of the boy or girl, the possibilities for stuttering or stammering to secure a firm hold on their muscular and nervous system are very great. Next to the age of second dentition, children at the age of puberty are most susceptible to stammering or stuttering. During adolescence, the annual rate of growth in height, weight and strength is increased and often doubled or more. The power of the dis- eases peculiar to childhood abates and the liability to the far more numerous diseases of maturity begins, so that with the liability to both it is not 146 STAMMERING strange that this period is marked at the same time by increased morbidity. The significant fact about stuttering in chil- dren as far as it relates to the period of adolescence, is that this stage marks the most pronounced susceptibility to the malady as well as the time during which it may most quickly pass into the chronic stage. Examinations show that the largest percentage of stutterers among boys was at the ages of eight, thirteen and sixteen, while the largest percentage among girls was at the ages of seven, twelve and sixteen the earlier age of severity in girls being explained by the fact that the girl reaches a given state of maturity more quickly than a boy. Parents of stammering or stuttering children between the ages of twelve and twenty, may well note with alarm the increasing nervousness, the hyper-sensitive feelings, the overpowering self- consciousness and the morbid tendencies which mark a state of mental depression, brooding and worry over troubles both real and fancied. Period of Most Frequent Suicide: Statistics gathered over a period of years indicate that the ITS CAUSE AND CUBE 147 cases of suicide of stammering children occur at this time with greater frequency than at any other. Rarely has a case been found where a child has attempted to take his life before the age of 12 and seldom after the age of 20. At frequent intervals there can be found in any of the large papers, a very brief note of the suicide of a child who had found life too much of a burden for him to bear and who, as a conse- quence, fell to brooding over his troubles and as the easiest way out of them, took his own life. A Chicago boy attempted suicide by inhaling gas, although he was discovered before it was too late. Another took his own life by shooting himself with a revolver given him some years ago as a birthday present; still another took poison as the easiest way out of his humiliation, embarrassment and despair. The average age of these boys was about 16^2 years, which marks a period of intense self-con- sciousness and extreme sensitiveness of the youth to ridicule and disgrace. Tendency to Rapid Progress: The condition of the young person between the ages of 12 and 10 14)8 STAMMERING 20 can hardly be considered to be normal in any way. The physical processes are un-normal and are undergoing a change, and the mental facul- ties, too, are un-normal, overwhelmed as they are with new emotions and sensations. The nervous condition is marked by a much higher nervous irritability, which contributes to a condition most favorable for the rapid progress of the speech disorder, always easily aggravated by a sub- normal physical, mental or nervous condition. Cases where the Intermittent Tendency is a pro- nounced characteristic are liable at this period to find the alternate periods of relief and recurrence to be more frequent than ever before and to note a marked tendency of their trouble to recur with constantly increasing malignancy. Cases that at the age of 11 or 12, for instance, might have been said to have been in an incipient state, have com- monly been known at this age to pass through the successive intermediate stages of the trouble and become of a deep-seated and chronic nature in a surprisingly short period of time. In some cases where the transition from a sim- ple to the complex form of the difficulty takes place at this age, it is found that the disorder has passed beyond the curable stage, in which case, ITS CAUSE AND CUKE 149 of course, nothing is left to the unfortunate stam- merer but the prospects of a lif e of untold misery and torture, deprived of companionship, ostra- cized from society and debarred from participa- tion in either business or the professions. Chances for Outgrowing: The chances for outgrowing a speech disorder at this age are con- siderably less than at any other time in the previ- ous life of the individual. The unbalanced gen- eral condition tends to make the stammerer more susceptible instead of less so. As previously ex- plained, this period marks the time when speech disorders progress rapidly from bad to worse and, as a consequence, the chances for outgrowing diminished from 1 per cent, before the age of 6 to practically zero after the age of 12. Suggestions: There is little that can be said for the good of the young person at these ages. The time for home treatment is past. The simple suggestions offered for the assistance of those in the Formative or Speech-Setting Periods would be of little value here because the growth of the individual has made the eradication of the trouble quite improbable without a complete re-education 150 STAMMERING along correct speech lines best obtained from an institution devoting its efforts to that work. Whatever steps are taken, however, should be taken before the disorder has become rooted in the muscular and nervous system and before it has passed into the Chronic Stage. CHAPTER XIII WHERE DOES STAMMERING LEAD? IN answering the question: "Where Does Stammering Lead?" nothing truer can be found than the words of a man who has stam- mered himself: "What pen can depict the woefulnese, the intensified suf- fering of the inveterate stammerer, confirmed, stereotyped in a malady seemingly worse than death f Are the afflictions, mental and physical, of the pelted, brow-beaten, down- trodden stutterer imaginary? Nonsense! There is not a word of truth in the idea. His sufferings all the time, day in and day out, at home and abroad, are real intense purgatorial. And none but those who have drunk the bitter cup to its dregs feel and know its death, death, double death! These afflicted ones die daily and the graves to them seem pleasant and delightful. The sufferings of the deaf and dumb are myths but a drop in the ocean compared to what I endured! And who cared for me? Who! I was the laughing stock, a subject of scoffing and ridicule, often. I could fill an octavo with the miseries I endured from early childhood till the elapsement of forty summers." Thus does the Rev. David F. Newton, himself a stammerer for forty years, speak of stammering and stuttering and its effects. And Charles Kingsley, a noted English divine and author who 152 STAMMEEING stammered, paints the stammerer's future in words of experience that no stammerer should ever forget: "The stammerer's life is a life of misery, growing with hia growth and deepening as his knowledge of life and his aspirations deepen. One comfort he has, truly, that his life will not be a long one. Some may smile at this assertion; let them think for themselves. How many old people have they ever heard stammer? I have known but two. One is a very slight case, the other a very severe one. He, a man of fortune, dragged on a very painful and pitiful existence nervous, decrepit, asthmatic kept alive by continual nursing. Had he been a laboring man, he would have died thirty years sooner than he did." To the man who has never been through the suf- fering that results from stammering or who has never been privileged to watch the careers of stammerers and stutterers over a period of years, these final results of stammering seem impossible. The inexperienced observer can only ask in won- der: "How can stammering or stuttering bring a man or woman to these depths of despair?" To the stammerer who has but begun to taste the sorrows of a stammerer's life these effects of stammering appear to be the ultimate result of an wnusual case never the inevitable result of his own trouble. Doubtless if Charles Kingsley were with us ITS CAUSE AND CURE 153 today, he could look back and tell us of the day when he, too, was sure that stammering was but a trifle. He, too, could point out the time when he felt that sometime, somehow, his stammering would magically depart and leave him free to talk as others talked. And yet, having gone down the road through a long life of usefulness, Kingsley's is the voice of a mature experience which says to every stammerer: "Beware there are pitfalls ahead I" And this man is right. Results of Stammering: Experience proves that the results of continued stammering or stut- tering are definite and positive, and that they are inevitable. Stammering is known to be at the root of many troubles. It causes nervousness, self -consciousness and sometimes brings about a mental condition bordering on complete mental breakdown. It causes mental sluggishness, dis- sipates the power-of-concentration, weakens the power of will, destroys ambition and stands be- tween the sufferer and an education. There is no affliction more annoying or embar- rassing to its victim than stammering. No mat- ter how bright the intellect may be, if the tongue is unable easily and quickly to formulate the 154 STAMMERING words expressing thought, the individual is held back in business and is debarred from the pleas- ures of social and home life. Stammering is a drawback to children in school. To be unable to recite means failure. It means humiliation. It means disgrace in the eyes of the other pupils. And finally, it means valu- able time wasted not in getting an education but in suffering untold misery in TRYING to get one and failing. A boy fourteen years of age, who has failed to advance in school, and who finds stammering a handicap of serious proportions, tells me : "I am fourteen years old and only in the fifth grade. I am afraid to recite because of my stuttering, and because of my not reciting when my teachers call on me, I am get- ting low marks in school and do not know if I will ever get through." One mother writes : "My little girl will not go to Sunday School because she does not like the other children to look at her so straight when she stammers." A boy says : "I am thirteen years old and in school. I am afraid to recite because of my stuttering; and because of my not reciting I get low average in studies." ITS CAUSE AND CUBE 155" Another boy told me: "I am now in the third year of my high school course. On the first day of the term I went to school, I made sueh a miserable thing of myself that I quit. The school superin- tendent and principal saw me when I came back the second day as I was carrying my books out. Of course they stopped me and I made an explanation. I couldn't tell any of the new teachers my name. It was impossible to make any kind of a recitation. I was introduced to all of my teachers and have been stumbling along ever since with grades anywhere from to 60." A Social Drawback: No stammerer but knows that his malady marks him for the half-sup- pressed smiles of thoughtless people and the unkind remarks of those who really know nothing of the suffering which these unkind remarks occasion. It is true, but unfortunate, that the stammerer is not wanted in any social gathering, he can provide no entertainment, save at his own expense, and of all people he is most ill at ease when out among others. A young lady writes : "Mr. Bogue, I would give one of my eyes to get rid of stammering. That is all I am after. Please excuse this awful writing. I AM SO NEBVOUS I CAN HAKDLY GET THE PEN INTO THE INK BOTTLE." 156 STAMMERING Here is a letter from one man: "I am 36 years old, and have stammered for 28 years. I don't stammer so bad, but just bad enough to spoil my life. I always have to take a back seat in company. I belong to three lodges, but I do not take part in any of them because I am afraid they will ask me to take part in the order. It would make me feel cheap. I have often felt like commit- ting suicide, but I would pull my nerves together and make the best of it again. I am now a janitor at a school." Hopeless in Business: There is not a young man stammerer in this whole country who would not work night and day to be cured of stammer- ing if he realized the hopelessness of trying to be a success in a business way, handicapped by stam- mering, unable to talk fluently, clearly and in- telligently. A man says: "I am 33 years old and single. I have stammered ever since I was a child. It has made me nervous. At my age it is very embarrassing to me to stutter. I kept getting more nervous from year to year, and finally I have had to give up my position. I was a long-hand -biller for ten years, but I am now troubled with writer's cramp and unable to do much. I can't get a clerk's job because of my stuttering." And here is another a man grown, who too late realized the futility of trying to get an education ITS CAUSE AND CURE 157 while yet handicapped by stammering. He said, a while back: "I must say my stammering has spoiled my life and robbed me of a successful career. I would give much if my parents bad sent me to be cured of stammering when a boy, instead f trying as they did to educate me." Stammerer Appears Illiterate: No matter how great the stammerer's knowledge may be, he often appears to be illiterate simply because he is unable to express himself in words. His knowl- edge is locked up by his infirmity, the same as though he had a steel band drawn over his mouth and fastened with a padlock which he is unable to unlock for want of a proper key. The man with the locked-up knowledge is under as great a handicap as the man without knowledge. A man who had a chance to be a big success in business, had he not stammered, says : "Stammering is the cause of all my trouble. My earlier associates have shunned me for several years, and I have sought the worst class of dives and the lowest kind of com- panions, where I was reasonably certain that I would not come in contact with those with whom I had associated in earlier years. My eyes are wet with tears tears of remorse and regret because I see no chance in life for me now." The stammerer who thinks that success comes to 158 STAMMERING the man who stammers who believes that the business world is willing to put up with anything less than fluent speech, should read this heart- broken letter from a young man: "I am a bookkeeper, and dearly love my work, but am afraid that I am going to have to give it up because my speech is getting worse, and I have noticed that the boss has mentioned it to me a couple of times now, and it almost breaks my heart to know that my position is going to get away from me. No one realizes how much one suffers, and I'm afraid I'm going to break down with nervous prostra- tion soon. When one day is over with me, I wonder how I am going to get through with the next one." What are the results of stammering? Should anyone ask that question, I could point to in- stances in my own experience that would prove that almost every undesirable condition of human existence may be the result of stammering. I have seen young men who are business failures, dejected, hopeless, drifting along, men who in early years were intellectual giants, and who before their death were mere children in mental power, because they allowed stammering to destroy every valuable faculty they possessed. I could point to children whom stammering had held back almost from the time they began to talk give cases of young men depressed, em- ITS CAUSE AND CURE 159 barrassed, unsuccessful, because they stammer cite instances of all the worth-while things in life turned from the path of a young woman because she stammered. Yet in the past, not one of these knew what was coming. Not one realized where the trail was leading. No stammerer can of himself see into the future. But he can, at least, look into the future of others, who, like himself, are stam- merers, and avoid the pitfalls into which they have fallen and save himself the mistakes they have made. PART in THE CURE OF STAMMERING AND STUTTERING CHAPTER I CAN STAMMERING BEALLY BE CUBED? IT has only been a few years since the impres- sion was abroad that stammering was incur- able. Not a particle of hope was held out to the afflicted individual that any semblance of a cure was possible by any method. This erroneous idea that stammering could not be cured grew up in the mind of the average person as a result of one or all of the following conditions : 1st The inability of the stammerer to cure himself and his further inability to outgrow the trouble, (although he was repeatedly told that he would outgrow it) was the first reason that led to the foolish and totally unfounded belief that stammering could not be cured. 2nd The principles of speech and the un-normal condition known as stammering have been surrounded with a great deal of mystery in the years gone by. The idea has been widely prevalent that the affliction was one sent by Provi- ITS CAUSE AND CUKE 161 deuce aa a punishment for some act committed by the sufferer or his forbears. This and many other ideas bor- dering upon superstition, are responsible, too, to a great degree for the belief that stammering is incurable. 3rd Even if an attempt to cure stammering was made, this attempt was based upon the ' ' supposition ' ' that stammer- ing was a physical trouble, due to some defect in the organs of speech. It followed that since no one was ever able to discover any physical defect, no one knew the true cause of the disorder, nor how to treat it successfully. 4th Unfortunately there have been in the field a number of irresponsible charlatans, preying upon the stammerer with claims to cure, while in fact they knew little or nothing of the disorder, had never stammered themselves, nor had the slightest knowledge of the correct methods of procedure in the cure of stammering. The failure of such as these to do any good led to a widespread belief that there was no successful method for the eradication of speech dis- orders. From an experience covering more than twenty- eight years, during which time the author has cor- responded with 210,000 persons who stammer and has personally met and diagnosed about 22,000 cases, it has been proved that all of these beliefs are fallacies of the worst character. Given any person who stutters or stammers and who has no organic defect and is as intelligent as the average child of eight years, it has been found that the Unit Method of Restoring Speech will eradicate 162 STAMMERING the trouble at its source and by removing the cause, entirely remove the defective utterance. The Stammerer's Case Not Hopeless: Stam- merers should fix this fact firmly in mind : Stam- mering can be cured! There is hope, positive, definite hope for every case this fact is based on every imaginable form of stuttering or stammer- ing. It is not, in other words, a mere idle state- ment based on theory or guess-work, but a mathe- matical truth, taken from experience. I recall very well the case of a man of 32 who astie speech, 67 278 STAMMEEING Parents, advice to, 127, 141, 264 Peculiarities, cause of, 90 sing without difficulty, 90, 91 talk to animals, 31 talk when alone, 31, 91-94 Philadephla, author's experience in, 40 Physical Deformity, (See Organic Defect) Physician, author's experience with, 21 Pitch, variations in, 78 Plau-of-attack, 199 Position, author seeks for, 36-38 Procrastinators, example of, 272 incurable, 169 typical case, 170, 171 Progress, concealed, 103 daily record of, 201 tests to determine, 202 Progressive Tendency, concealed progress, 103 manifested in author's case, 28 periods of transition, 102 usually present, 103 Pronunciation, Defective, 64 Purpose, Unity of, 256 Recitations, oral necessary to memory, 138 written not equal to oral, 138 Recurrent Tendency, (Sec Intermittent Tendency) Responsibility, of parents to child. 268 Ridicule, author object of, 16 retards mental progress, 137, 138 School, author's experience in, 16-18 beginning of, for stammering child, 136 problems of stammering child in. 187 ending stammerers to, 138-140 Second Dentition, (See Dentition) Sounds, Substitution of, 65 Source of First Word. 126 Spasmodic Movement! (See Movements) Specialist, every teacher a, 253 Speech, Defective, cause of, 75 Speech, Defective in Children, "baby talk," eradication of, 131 "baby talk," may cause perma- nent defect, 131 dangers of adolescence, 144-146 education a difficulty, 138-140 formative period, 128 four periods of growth, 120 pre-speaking period, 120 proper procedure, 266 speech-setting period, 136 suggestions for home treatment. 132-134 Speech, assistance needed by child, 129- 131 denned, 190 evolution of, in child, 129 how first produced by child, 121 how produced, 73 monetary value of, 243, 244 source of first word, 126 Speech, Spastic, 67 Speech, Stoppage in, 63 Speech, success-value of, 244, 245 true principles constant, 40, 189 Speech Impediment, 63 Speech, Specialist, should have stammered, 193 Stammering, author's first books on, 11 author studies many books on, 57 bars education, 154 basic causes of, 80, 81 causes failure in business, 157 causes nervousness, 153 cause of insanity, 116 defined, 69 despondency resulting from. 114 disease as cause, 88. 89 effect on health, 117, 118 effect on will-power, 116 elementary, defined, 70 elementary stage, 105 fall or injury as cause, 85-87 fright or nerve shock as cause. 83-85 heredity as cause, 88 heredity in author's case, 52 mental strain tells, 115 mimicry, basic causes of. 81, 82 ITS CAUSE AND CURE 279 Stammering Continued Newton, Rev. David F., ou ef- fects of. 152 peculiarities of, (See Peculiarities) primary mental stupe, 106 progress of, 105, 106 spasmodic stage, 106 stammerer appears illiterate, 157 successive stages of, 105 suicides resulting from, 114 weakening effects of, 29 Stuttering, aphasia, 105 choreatic, 66 chronic stage, 104 definition, 65 first a physical trouble, 104 phases of, 66 progress of, 103 simple, 104 successive stages of, 103 thought, defined. 67 unconscious, defined, 67 St. Vitus Dance, (See Chorea) Substitution, a deleterious practice. 165. 166 Suggestion, Mental, (See Hypnotism) Suicides, ages of most frequent, in stam- merers, 114, 115, 146, 147 result of stammering, 114 Surgeon, author's experience with, 49 Surgery, period of popularity, 188 Synchronization, result of, 193 Synonym Stammerer, The, 165 1 able, author'! experience at, 19 Teeth, defective, 65 Test, final cure, 202 first treatment, 202 Theories, half-baked English. 11 Thought Lapse, (See Aphasia) "Tic Speech," (See Choreatic Stuttering) Tongue, malformation of, 65 slitted for cure, 188 Tongue Tie, typical case, 168 Tonsils, Removal of, recommended to author, 40 advice on, 49 Transition, Periods of, 102 Traveling Medicine Man, author's experience with, 22 Treatments, author's experience with elec- trical, 46 home suggestions for, of chil- dren, 132-134 Turning Point In Life, author's, 55 Typical Cases, (See Cases, Typical) Visitors, author's dread of, 19 Vocal Cords, action of, 73 how used in speech, 190 in production of voice, 73 Voice, how produced, 73 organs used in producing, 1!)0 Wilson, President, faultless speak er, 129 Word, First, importance of, 126 influence of heredity on, 127 source of, 126 Youth, dangers of adolescence. 144-146 period of most frequent suicide, 146, 147 period of rapid progress, 147 148, 149 ADVERTISEMENTS THE BOGUE INSTITUTE INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA N INSTITUTION for the successful treatment of stammering, stutter- ing and kindred forma of defective speech. Training is based on scientific reco- ordination of brain and speech. No drugs, electricity, hypnotism or medicines employed. Bogue Unit Method used exclusively. Best of home care and comfort are to be found in the dormitories which are maintained under the supervision of and in connection with the Institute. In continuous operation for more than twenty-eight years under the personal direction of the founder. BENJAMIN NATHANIEL BOGUE President and Principal THE EMANCIPATOR Edited and Published by Benjamin Nathaniel Bogue MAGAZINE devoted to the interests of perfect speech. The only maga- zine for stammerers published in the United States. The Emancipator teaches and believes in the philosophy of suc- cess, of achievement, of accomplishment. King- ing through the pages of The Emancipator is the clarion call to be what you wish to be, to do what you wish to do, and accomplish what you wish to accomplish. The Emancipator has made dozens of people dissatisfied with the half-life of a stammerer. It has shown them the beauties and the ad- vantages of the complete, successful, useful, overflowing, joyous life that can be theirs. The Emancipator has put ambition into the indiffer- ent and listless, courage into the heart of the fearful, confidence into the hand of the timid and a positive will into the being of the neg- ative personality. The whole purpose of The Emancipator might be summed up in six words: To better yow condition in life. Snbfcription, $1.00 per year. Sample copy, lOc Date Due APR 2 5 197ft .,.AY o 1 PEP/PI Library Bureau Cat. no. 113? .UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY A 001330361 5 ' WMU75 B6?5s 1922 Bogue, Benjamin N Stazranering; its cause and cure. MEDICAL SCIENCES LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, IRVINE IRVINE, CALIFORNIA 92664