Mabel E. Driscoll Bailey

(April 28, 1904 – July 29, 1984)

Eureka College faculty member

“Today, psychologists believe that most people think with their feelings and base their actions on this rather than logic. There is one field in which abstract, impersonal, and detached thinking is applied and that is business. Business is conducted with logical thinking rather than with feelings.”

Thinking on the basis of feelings came natural to Mabel E. Driscoll Bailey, who was blind from birth. During more than two decades of service as an English professor at Eureka College, Dr. Bailey used her expertly attuned sensory skills to see the institution in a fashion that few others could imagine. She had a vision for Eureka College that transcended the ordinary because she understood what constituted the essential core of the school’s identity. Liberation was for Dr. Bailey the ultimate purpose of study at a liberal arts and sciences college.

Born in South Grove Township, near Kirkland, Illinois, Mabel E. Driscoll did not permit her disability to serve as a disadvantage. She was raised in a religious household where she was taught to recognize the blessings that each life carries and she became inculcated with the desire to make hers a life of service. She believed in the type of muscular Christianity that had animated the Founders of Eureka College, and her life was a testament to doing and serving in all ways and at all times.

She earned her academic degrees from Wheaton College, the University of Illinois, and the University of Iowa. She married Agard H. Bailey, Jr., on April 23, 1948. The couple taught for a time at the Scattergood Hostel that the Quaker community had established at West Branch, Iowa. Dr. Bailey also taught for a time at William Penn College in Oscalousa, Iowa.

When the Baileys moved to Eureka, Illinois, Mable became an English professor at the College while Agard served as the College Librarian for fifteen years. They remained active members in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and were committed activists involved in various campaigns for social and economic justice.

Dr. Bailey published two books during her professional career: Maxwell Anderson: The Playwright as Prophet (1957) and a shorter work on her teaching philosophy titled Let the Students Talk. Her first book was featured in a prominent display at the U.S. Pavilion at the 1964 World’s Fair in New York.

Dr. Bailey had other significant accomplishments during her career. She was the first president of the Illinois Association of Blind Teachers and she served as the president of the National Association of Blind Teachers in 1980. She also was the recipient of the coveted Mary McCann Award presented by the Illinois Council for the Blind.

Mabel E. Driscoll Bailey understood that things that are meaningful often take time to nurture. She would remind her students that “You can learn a set of facts quickly. A scientist can prove something to a class quickly, but emotional growth takes time. You can’t mass produce things that grow. This is a slow process.”

Helen Keller once said, “The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart.” Mabel E. Driscoll Bailey would have agreed. Her excellence in teaching and her passion for literature and the liberal arts opened the eyes of many during a long and illustrious career.