James Smedley Brown

James Smedley Brown was a nineteenth-century educator of the deaf who is credited with the publication of the first dictionary of American Sign Language. He attended Oberlin College, and died in 1863.

Career

Teacher at the Ohio School for the Deaf (1842–1845) Superintendent at the Indiana School for the Deaf (1845–1852) Superintendent at the Louisiana School for the Deaf (1853–1860)

Sign-language dictionaries

Brown published "A Vocabulary of Mute Signs" in 1856, as well as "A Dictionary of Signs and of the Language of Action, for the Use of Deaf-Mutes, their Instructors and Friends; and, also, designed to facilitate to members of the Bar, Clergymen, Political Speakers, Lecturers, and to the Pupils of Schools, Academies, and Colleges, The Acquisition of a Natural, Graceful, Distinctive and Life-Like Gesticulation" in 1860.