Thomas “Blind Tom” Wiggins
Savant is a term that refers to autistic individuals that showcase extraordinary talents in areas such as art, math, and music. Thomas “Blind Tom” Wiggins is known to be one of history’s most accomplished savant. Thomas Wiggins was born a slave to Mingo and Charity Wiggins in May of 1849 in Harris County, Georgia. . The Wiggins were then slaves, the property of one Wiley Jones, and Charity Wiggins asked Jones's 17-year-old daughter Valeria to name the newborn boy, the youngest of her three children. This may have been a canny strategy to prevent Jones from killing the baby, who was blind, because disabled slave children were considered a burden. The strategy worked. Tom Wiggins lived, and within a year Jones sold the entire family to General James Neil Bethune, a local lawyer who had gained his rank while serving in a war against the Creek tribe in 1832. In 1850, General James Neil Bethune purchased Tom’s family which turned out to be a pivotal point in the start of Tom’s musical career. Bethune was not only a prominent citizen of the nearby city Columbus, but his family had a strong passion for music. Early on, little Tom did little manual labor as it was not suitable for a blind toddler. However, it was soon evident that young Wiggins had a musical gift beyond comprehension. Even as a toddler, Wiggins's showed signs that he was somehow different. His gestures were unusual and he would sometimes be combative, sometimes suffering from fits during the night. He also showed a talent for recalling seemingly unimportant phrases and details. While modern historians have recognized such behaviors as signs that Wiggins was autistic
Wiggins's interest in music and sound was precocious and uncanny. "He listened for hours to the little corn mill in the kitchen or to the rain in the gutter spouts," wrote John Ryan Seawright in the Oxford Book of Great American Music Writing.
His communication skills were minimal. Yet after listening to Bethune's children play the piano, Tom – only a few years old – climbed onto the piano bench and reproduced the chords he had heard. He had never taken a piano lesson. He had the ability to reproduce sounds with little effort and would shock the family by replicating tunes on the piano with no formal training. This led the family to formally teach the boy music, and Mary Bethune worked with Tom to teach him to play the piano. composing his first piece at age five, a piano imitation of a thunderstorm.
Tom’s first public performance was at the Temperance Hall in Columbus in 1857 at the tender age of eight years. The family soon realized that they could make a great profit off of this boy’s talents. In 1858, Bethune made an agreement with planter and promoter Oliver Perry to “lease” Tom for a period of three years for the price of $15,000. During this time, Perry booked a tour through the south starting in Savannah and ending in Baltimore. However, in 1861, the onset of the Civil War forced the end of the extension of his tour in Northern states. As the war progressed, Tom continued to tour venues in the South.
Just after the Civil War, James Bethune and his family moved from Georgia to Virginia. At this time, Tom was still a minor so Bethune convinced Mingo and Charity Wiggins to have Thomas Wiggins sign an indenture under which he would control Wiggins musical career for five years as well as 90% of his earnings. This indenture erased Tom’s short-lived freedom from slavery by again becoming physical property of his former owner. Blind Tom received a $20 monthly allowance, food, shelter and musical instruction. His parents would receive $500 a year, food and shelter. Estimates put Bethune's annual take anywhere from $18,000 to $100,000.
In 1894, John Bethune was accidentally killed when he fell under the wheels of a train. His will stipulated that his estranged wife Eliza was not to receive any of his inheritance. Infuriated, Eliza Bethune managed to win custody of Wiggins through a long court battle and an arrangement with Wiggins' mother. From 1887 through 1904, Blind Tom performed under Eliza's management. In his last years, Wiggins played the piano in seclusion. He died of a stroke on June 13, 1908, in Hoboken, N.J. He was 59.
Career performances
requiring him to perform up to four times a day. At his concerts, Wiggins mimicked the sounds of trains, birds, wind, and rain. He could perform three songs at a time in different keys, one with each hand while singing the third.