Obituary: Stephen Barrett / President of Blind & Vision Rehabilitation Services of Pittsburgh
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Stephen Barrett, who started visionary programs to help those who had lost their sight and hearing to live self-reliant, rewarding lives, died Saturday of esophageal cancer. The recently retired president and CEO of Blind & Vision Rehabilitation Services of Pittsburgh was 60.
"He was a creator, someone who could envision what services needed to be in place," said C.C. Davis, who had worked with him at the Helen Keller National Center.
Mr. Barrett once told him that he wanted to be a symphony conductor.
"But it was always my feeling that he was writing a symphony. Those of us who are providers in the field were players in the orchestra. We just tried to perform and interpret his wishes as best we could," he said.
The Texas native had just graduated from the University of North Texas in Denton when he met the love of his life in a Dairy Queen. Seeking a job so that they could afford to get married, he went to a state employment office. It sent him to the Texas Commission for the Blind, which hired him to go to the homes of blind people to teach daily living skills, such as cooking.
"It was something he wanted to try and, when he did, he fell madly in love with it," said Bobbie Barrett, his wife of 37 years.
In 1975, he was hired as a regional representative for the Helen Keller National Center, which is based in New York and serves people who are both blind and deaf. He rose through its ranks to become executive director.
While he was its representative in Texas and surrounding states, he worked to move deaf and blind people out of large institutions, either to live with their families or in small group homes. He set up family training programs to help their relatives, established some group homes and started a camp that is still going strong, Mr. Davis said.
"He took on hard challenges. When other people felt they couldn't work successfully with people with dual challenges, Steve was there to teach them how to do it and encourage them to be successful at it," said Richard Welsh, his predecessor at Blind & Vision Rehabilitation Services of Pittsburgh, who knew him professionally and recruited Mr. Barrett to succeed him.
First Published April 23, 2010 12:00 am
