Gray, William

Born in Scone, Scotland; in 1819, began attending the Institution for the Education of the Deaf and Dumb at Edinburgh, Scotland, finishing there about 1824 and going to work as a tailor. Emigrated to Canada in 1855 and set up a soon-failed tailoring business. Met George Tait, who proposed opening a school for deaf children, with Gray participating as a teacher. Officially but controversially credited as the founder of the school for the deaf in Halifax, Nova Scotia, despite contemporary assertions by Tait and others that Gray was a second-rate teacher and guilty of drunkedness and other faults; he was dismissed by the school's board in 1870. Emigrated to Massachusetts about 1873; entered an almshouse about 1880 or 1881, dying there from paraplegia. George Tait (q.v.) is the traditional founder of the Halifax school.