More News

10 Ways to Celebrate International Stuttering Awareness Day
October 22 is International Stuttering Awareness Day. This is a great opportunity to focus public attention on a complex disorder that touches 70 million people around the world and more than 3 million in the U.S. alone.
Netherlands Workshop Focuses on Preschool Children
A workshop designed for speech-language pathologists who want to be trained to practice the DCM treatment that was investigated in the RESTART trial will be held in the Netherlands from July 31- August 2, 2019.
Remembering Gloria Vanderbilt
Ms. Vanderbilt was a model, actress, fashion designer, artist, heiress, and socialite. People who were around in the 1970s and 1980s will remember how she jump started a $100 million-dollar fashion empire, mostly with designer jeans, but also blouses, shoes, jewelry and perfume.
Boy Rocks It in Musical
Ever since he was 6 years old, Eamonn Hubert has been performing. While he’s been in countless shows with his dad, thanks to their band Hot Dogs & Gin, this year he performed on one of his biggest stage yet — School of Rock the Musical. While Eamonn was on a U.S. tour with the group, we caught up with him to learn more!
Bravery on the Front Lines
Born in October of 1911, Gertrude Tompkins came from a wealthy and privileged background. Her father, Vreeland Tompkins, was a top chemist for John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil with many patents of his own, securing the wealth of the Tompkins family for many years. Vreeland stuttered severely, and naturally was upset that his daughter began to stutter like he did.
Waverly the Therapy Dog Remembered
Waverly, a therapy dog who worked with those who stutter in Alaska, passed away recently. She would have been six years old in June.
An Update from Author Vince Vawter
The Asheville (NC) Community Theatre hosted a "table reading" on two days in March of PAPERBOY, A NEW MUSICAL, based on Vince Vawter’s novel of a boy growing up with a stutter in 1950s Memphis.
Same Mission, New Website
With nearly one hundred million visitors each year and inquiries from more than 137 countries around the world, the Stuttering Foundation’s website has become the leading global resource for people who stutter, therapists, teachers, and parents.
Summer Magazine
Our new Summer 2019 Magazine is filled with exciting articles, including a look at our new website, letters and drawings from school children, research into children's expressive language growth, and much more. You can view it as an e-magazine or download a PDF.
Peggy Lipton Remembered
On Saturday, May 11, 2019, the stuttering community lost one of its most visible celebrities with the death of actress Peggy Lipton at age 72.

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CELEBRITY FOCUS

Bill Walton

From BillWalton.com

Thank you for your interest in my life long problem with my speech and communication skills. I was a very shy and reserved young man who could not speak at all without severely stuttering until I was 28 years old. Always a success in the classroom and on the basketball court, I took refuge in the things that I did well as a youngster. A straight A student, my athletic abilities covered the deficiencies that limited my overall growth and development. The game of basketball was my religion, the gym my church. It was a convenient way of avoiding my responsibilities of developing my human relation skills.

When I was 28, a chance encounter at a social event with Hall of Fame broadcaster Marty Glickman completely changed my life in so many ways that things have never been the same since, nor have they ever been better. That day, in a very brief, private conversation (one way, mind you, since I literally could not speak at the time) Marty explained, patiently and concisely, that talking, communicating was a skill not a gift or a birthright and that like any skill, whether it be sports, music, business or whatever, needed to be developed over a lifetime of hard work, discipline, organization and practice. Marty gave me some simple tips that day and then encouraged me to take those keys and apply them to methods of learning that I had received from the special teachers that I had come across in my life, particularly the 6 Hall of Fame basketball coaches that I had played for throughout my career. The beginning of my whole new life was as simple as that. No gimmicks, tricks or shortcuts. Just the realization that with some help, guidance and a lot of hard work that I too could do what seemed so easy, simple and natural to everyone else, yet seemed impossibly out of my reach and comprehension.

Emily Blunt

Actress Emily Blunt struggled with stuttering early in her life. A teacher encouraged her to act in a school play at age 12 despite her stuttering.

Blunt’s name is prominently featured on the Stuttering Foundation's list of Famous People Who Stutter.

Bob Love

Bob Love has dreamt about being a great public speaker since his early days in Bastrop Louisiana, even though, as a young man, he could barely put two words together, let alone speak a full sentence.

In spite of his severe stuttering disability, Bob Love, the son of a sharecropper, rose to become a Chicago Bulls NBA superstar, whose records were eventually surpassed by Michael Jordan. Throughout his entire athletic career, Bob Love kept his stuttering a secret from the fans who adored him, thinking he could do his “talking” on the basketball court.

Winston Churchill

Seeking to "remove Winston Churchill's stutter by second guessing the diagnosis" indicates neither a truthful retelling of history nor an informed opinion about a complex speech disorder, say experts in the field of speech-language pathology.

Recent news reports that quote Dr. John Mather, a Washington physician, as saying that Churchill's stutter "is a lie" brought adamant critical response from specialists in the field of stuttering and fluency disorders.

Marilyn Monroe

From Edward S. Herrington's letter to Southcoasttoday.com

I am writing in response to "The importance of voice" (May 29), which mentioned that famous actor James Earl Jones struggled with stuttering. Another famous voice that you cited was the trademark breathy voice of Marilyn Monroe; however, you did not make mention of the fact that Marilyn Monroe also struggled with stuttering at various points in her life, sometimes very painfully.