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Answer:
The Silent Worker, published at New Jersey School for the Deaf in Trenton, was founded in 1888 as the Deaf-Mute Times and was renamed The Silent Worker soon afterwards. It began as a simple school newsletter. Under George S. Porter’s distinguished editorship, TSW reached its peak of quality. It became a popular national Deaf Community newsmagazine, noted for its attractive design and quality of writing. Its coverage was eclectic and entertaining—original reportage, reprints, LPF “Exchange” news, travelogues, photography, original illustrations and cartoons, updates, school news, local news, social events, international history and politics, sports, Gallaudet College, controversies, humor. And, of course, NJSD news. As was customary with other top-quality magazines of its day, the covers featured original, beautifully executed illustrations—whether paintings or pen-and-ink. The artist Kelly H. Stevens did several TSW covers.
The “official” reason for its termination was that it in becoming a national magazine, TSW had strayed too far from its original purpose as a school publication. In reality, despite softening its once-vigorous opposition to oralism, it was too pro-Deaf for the liking of Alvin Pope, NJSD’s audist superintendent. When, after 35 years of editing TSW, Porter announced his retirement, Pope seized the opportunity to terminate TSW. Its final issue was published in June 1929 to coincide with Porter’s retirement. It was replaced by a mediocre school newsletter.
TSW, received the news with shock and considerable dismay. After TSW ceased publication, the community tried to find a way to revive it. No one had the capital or means to do so. They finally succeeded, when, in 1948, TSW was revived as the flagship publication of the NAD. Some of TSW’s old contributors participated in the resurrected version. TSW was later renamed The Deaf American, as the NAD didn’t want its publication confused with the Daily Worker, the official newspaper of the Communist Party of the USA (published from 1924 to 1958). The Deaf American was published until around 1988. The name survives as a series of monographs.
TSW’s original run (1888-1929) is now available online (http://www.aladin.wrlc.org/gsdl/collect/gasw/gasw.shtml). It’s a fascinating and valuable historic, journalistic, and cultural document.
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