Trying to book a lunch date with Jean Howes isn?t easy.

?I can?t do it Monday, because that?s the day I sing at the hospital,? she said. ?On Tuesday I sing at St. Brendan?s, on Wednesday I visit the rest homes and on Thursday I will be talking at the graduation of the pre-school children at Lagoon Park.?

That left Friday, the only day during the week that she was free. Mrs. Howes is 79 years old, but her schedule would exhaust the average 20 year old.

Mrs. Howes is a poet, a singer, musician, mother, grandmother and last year led a protest march in support of local taxi drivers. She also happens to be blind.

She gives partial credit for her active life to the late Lady Gladys Hall. During the recent Access Awareness Week Mrs. Howes rededicated one of her poems to Lady Hall, and had it framed and hung on the wall at Beacon House in Hamilton so that Lady Hall?s work with the blind won?t be forgotten.

?I got to know Lady Hall when she started to work for the blind in Bermuda in 1951,? said Mrs. Howes. ?I had heard of her. She was trying to do work for the blind, and I didn?t like people to say I was blind. I was silly.

?I had only been married for about five years to Lorraine (Ray) Southern. We had a son, Terry. Everything was very happy in my life. I had grown up doing things. I never talked about my blindness.?

Mrs. Howes has been blind since she was nine years old when she was struck in the eye by a stone.

?I was going to Mount Saint Agnes School,? she said. ?In summer I went to visit my friend who lived near where the Liberty Theatre is now. When I was walking by a lumber yard near my friend?s house there were some boys throwing stones.

?As I went in the gate of the lumber yard, a man came along and said to the boys to stop throwing stones, because a little girl wanted to go by. I came out and one boy still threw a stone. He didn?t mean to hit me, he wanted to hit someone else. That is what I tell the children when I go to the schools.?

In 1951, when Mrs. Howes was 25 years old, Lady Hall helped to set up the Society for the Blind. The society was first housed in the Department of Health, and then found a room on Burnaby Street with donations and help from volunteers.

The group soon outgrew this space and moved to the Hamilton Hotel. Unfortunately, the hotel burned down in 1955, taking the society?s work and records with it.

The Society for the Blind then moved back to Burnaby Street, but as the society grew, more room was needed. After fundraising enough money was found to buy Beacon House, on the corner of Dundonald Street and Cedar Avenue in 1962.

When Lady Hall first started her work Mrs. Howes thought that she wouldn?t be interested in her, because she was so high-functioning.

?The next thing I know she was coming to visit me,? said Mrs. Howes. ?It made a difference. She changed my life, really. I had never wanted to use a cane, not me. Lady Hall got me to see that it was nothing to be ashamed of to be blind.?

Lady Hall hired a woman called Eva Robinson to give Mrs. Howes typing lessons.

?I was thrilled to death,? said Mrs. Howes. ?After a while I got to use a cane. I used to be in a band and go out at night and play. I was like everybody else at night, but I wouldn?t go out in the day and use a cane.?

Learning to travel independently with a cane allowed Mrs. Howes to get a job in Hamilton with Howard Barritt, the manager of the Medical Hall.

?He gave me a job downstairs putting on prices,? said Mrs. Howes. ?That was in 1960. I worked for Gibbons Company for 31 years, and in Hamilton itself for about 37 years.?

She was one of the first people in Bermuda to get a guide dog. Her first guide dog was Moon, a cross between an Alsatian and a malamute.

She wasn?t very happy when she had to retire at the age of 65. Not only was she bored, but it was difficult for her to make ends meet, financially.

?Mr. Fernance Perry was a friend of mine,? she said. ?He called me and asked if I really wanted to retire. I said financially I didn?t think I could make it. He offered me a job in his office. He was very kind to me.?

In her spare time, Mrs. Howes performed with a small band at Astwood Hall. One day she asked Mr. Perry to come and listen to them play.

?He said ?do you think those fellows would come on television and show what Bermudians can do??? she said. ?I was playing with the late William (Cheese) Ray and a whole bunch of people. I said ? He said, ?yes, you can do it?.?

Mrs. Howes agreed to do a Christmas television programme, and 12 years later it is an annual event.

?The first year we had it was 1992,? she said. ?It was all country music the first two years. Then it was made into a variety show. Each year I try to find some talent that other people haven?t seen or heard and give people a chance.?

After a couple of years Gene Steede joined Mrs. Howes as host of the Christmas programme.

?He was very popular,? she said. ?Gene and I just hit it off. We got along real well together. I didn?t feel nervous with him. It worked out just fine. Gene comes on and he is funny and relaxing and he sings real good so we make a good combination.?

In the show?s early days, Mr. Perry and Mr. Ray took care of sponsoring the event. Today, Mrs. Howes takes care of the organising and finding sponsors and entertainers.

She said she became involved in a taxi protest over Government?s plans to introduce GPS in taxis, by accident.

?When the taxis went on the march they asked me to go along,? she said.

?My son, Terry, is a taxi driver, so I went along with them. His father was also a taxi driver. They said I was the instigator,? she said, laughing. ?I was only asked to go the night before.?

Mrs. Howes had expected to be walking along with other protestors, but was instead put at the head of the march.

Along the way, people called out their support to her and the taxi drivers.

?I felt like a queen,? she said.

Mrs. Howes said opportunities for the blind are getting better and that means the demands placed on Beacon House are changing.

?So many people have died, there are only three or four people left at Beacon House,? she said. ?The young people coming along now aren?t interested in baskets and trades. They want to be doing computers.

?We have two young blind people in Bermuda. They are both in England furthering their education. They are both very clever. I think one of them is going to work at the bank when he comes home in the summer.?

But she said Beacon House has been a wonderful and important part of her life. There is a picture of Lady Hall that hangs on the wall at Beacon House, but Mrs. Howes felt this wasn?t enough.

?I wrote the poem about Lady Hall 25 years ago when she died,? said Mrs. Howes.

?I wrote it because I didn?t want people to forget her. She started the work for the blind in Bermuda.

?I wanted something to go with the picture. Even though I wrote the poem in 1976, there wasn?t any explanation of what she did there.

My friend Jean Kelly and she had it framed for me and put it up there beside her picture.?

Long-time Beacon House supervisor Jean Gallagher is retiring from Beacon House. A farewell lunch is planned.

?Now it is very slow over there,? said Mrs. Howes. ?The cook is doing most things. There is nothing much happening. The years of Lady Hall was the heyday of Beacon House. We did everything. We worked and socialised there.

?There were many people who had never been out among people. That is why we don?t want Lady Hall to be forgotten.?