Harold Wilson
I was born in Monroe, Louisiana on September 25, 1966. I was totally sighted until the age of fifteen. At the time, my family and I lived in a rural town called Goldonna, Louisiana. I always wanted my own business. After six years of sitting at home wondering what a blind person would be able to do, I made a decision that would change my life forever. That decision was to do something about my blindness. I enrolled at the Louisiana Center for the Blind. The next nine months I was totally submerged in the National Federation of the Blind’s philosophy about blindness; the philosophy that a blind person can be whatever he or she chooses in life. If they have the determination and the drive, one can achieve any goal. When I graduated from the Louisiana Center for the Blind, I started at Louisiana Tech University, where I received my degree in elementary Education. I taught in a public school for two years and then started to teach Orientation and Mobility to blind students at the Louisiana Center for the blind.
In 2001, I moved to Arlington, Virginia. With the help of the Vocational Rehabilitation Services, I was given the chance to become my own business manager in the Randolph Sheppard Program. My location is at the United States Patent and Trademark office in Alexandria, Virginia. It is a wonderful location that provides my family and I financial support to make my dream of being a business manager come true. I am grateful to the Randolph Sheppard program. I have gained so much positive knowledge from being around positive blind venders such as the National Association of Blind Merchants, a division of the National Federation of the Blind.