Truth

Truth-tellers may heal our wounded democracy, not just by speaking loudly but also by quietly letting light through even when others obfuscate.

105 years ago, the principal of a school for the deaf in Milwaukee, Wisconsin resigned from her role in protest of the school administration’s failure to provide a facility that was fit for the pupils. It could not have been an easy decision; Frances Wettstein had worked in the field for thirty-five years.

Frances got her start by working with her paternal uncle-in-law Paul Binner at the Wisconsin Phonological Institute. She helped him develop a system of teaching deaf children to speak through vibration. Still considered a “new[-]fangled” project that was “unsteady” at the time of his 1896 death, Frances continued the work. “Scores of deaf children” graduated from the program and obtained employment, and nearly 80 other schools used the system in the United States.

Paul Binner was an immigrant to the United States, arriving in 1845. He married Frances’s paternal aunt Pauline in November 1862. Frances was born 26 February 1863 to Charles Theodore and Julia (Reuter) Wettstein. Her father had immigrated from Prussia with his family in 1848. Frances died 18 June 1937.

Frances’s story is not just about someone who brought attention to a neglected school. It is also about immigrants who helped shape our nation. The regime cannot erase their contributions and our history—and it cannot destroy our future.  

Sources

“Deaf School Head Resigns as Protest,” The Milwaukee Sentinel, 27 April 1920, p. 1, col. 6; imaged, OldNews (https://www.oldnews.com/en/record?lang=en&record_id=record-10640-25701733). All websites visited 21 December 2025.

Hypatia Boyd, Paul Binner and His Noble Work Among the Deaf (Milwaukee: none, 1901), 28; imaged, Google Books (https://books.google.com). Although Boyd was a student at the school when Frances was working there, the biography does not mention her. “School of the Oral Instruction of the Deaf,” Wisconsin Historical Society (https://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Records/Image/IM123731). Hypatia Boyd is seated second from left in the first row; Frances Wettstein and her uncle are in the center of the back row.

1900 U.S. census, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, population schedule, Milwaukee, enumeration district (ED) 146, sheet 1B, dwelling 13, family 12, Francis P. (37) in household of Carll F. Wettstein; imaged, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/7602/records/63758294).

“New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (1820–1957),” manifest sheet for Theodor Wettstein, 12, arrived 14 June 1848, from Bremen, Germany; database with images, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/7488/records/1023321454), citing National Archives microfilm publication M237 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.).

Frances Wettstein application, 21 April 1894, “U.S., Passport Applications, 1795-1925,” image 116 of 599; database and images, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/1174/records/1389976), citing NARA.

“Deaf Teacher Dies,” The Oshkosh (Wisconsin) Northwestern, 19 June 1937, p. 16, col. 1; imaged, Newspapers.com (www.newspapers.com/image/246096168).