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Among the activities of the Foundation can be mentioned research, consultation and field service, special services to blind individuals, publication of professional literature, and a special library on work with the blind. In 1948, on its 25th anniversary as a working agency, the Foundation reported in part on its work through those years:

Directly or indirectly the American Foundation for the Blind has promoted the establishment of state agencies for the blind in more than one-half of the states of the Union.

It has worked to improve the education of the blind through:
Surveys of schools for the blind;
The operation of an experimental and demonstration school jointly with Perkins Institution;
The conduct of a dramatics training project for blind children;
The development of educational Talking Book records for blind children;
Cooperation in the development of measuring scales of intelligence and educational achievement tests;
The publication of a professional magazine and books for teachers of blind children;
Higher education scholarship for promising young blind students.

In other areas the Foundation has:
Worked to provide broader opportunities for the employment of the blind through special studies of occupations and professions in which they may excel;
Obtained cooperation of the Federal Government in providing employment to thousands without sight, manufacturing commodities for the government, in which they have earned millions of dollars in wages;
Cooperated with agencies for the blind in obtaining a federal-state relief system for the blind which extends monetary assistance to scores of thousands of needy blind people;
Aided in the development of improved methods of braille printing and promoted the adoption of a uniform braille code for the English-speaking world;
Prevailed upon the Federal Government to inaugurate a system of library service for the blind, and developed the Talking Book for those who because of age or other reasons cannot read braille;
Developed special appliances to minimize the handicap of blindness, such as an improved braille typewriter, high quality Talking Book machines, low cost recording machines, scales for weighing, a thermometer which can be read by touch, measuring devices which open various fields of employment for the blind, etc.
Obtained the cooperation of the railroads and buses, enabling blind people to travel with a guide upon the payment of only one fare;
Provided special services to the deaf-blind and assisted local agencies for the blind and the deaf to give comprehensive care to this doubly-handicapped group;
Maintained summer school courses and institutes for in-service training for workers with the adult blind;
Conducted a demonstration summer vacation home for blind women where hundreds of sightless women find recreation and diversion;
Given thousands of radios to blind men and women who could not afford to buy them;
Made available to the blind, at cost or less, special watches, braille typewriters, standard typewriters, and other special equipment;
Conducted during and since World War II a special consultation service to blinded service men and veterans, giving each one a braille watch and other special equipment not then available from the government; Arranged for national and international conferences with special reference to the blind, such as a world conference on work for the blind, a national conference on the pre-school blind child, conferences of workshop managers, etc.;
Conducted a special reference and lending library of ink-print books on subjects of interest to workers for the blind.

When quoting these excerpts from the twenty-five year report the author is conscious of a deep sense of gratitude to the many friends of the Foundation, especially those whose generosity and active service as officers and board members helped the struggling young agency over the first difficult years. There were many of these friends, and they cannot all be listed. A special tribute, however, should be paid to Miss Prudence Sherwin of Cleveland, who served as vice-president for many years, to, Herbert H. White, who as treasurer guided the Foundation finances in the early years, and to William Ziegler, Jr. who even before his assumption of the presidency of the Foundation had proved himself a loyal friend. Their interest and willingness to serve should be an inspiration to the present members of the Board who now work with a new executive director. The new executive is Mr. M. Robert Barnett, a young and energetic man who had made a name for himself as head of the Florida Council for the Blind and who succeeded the author in 1949.

As a finish, it is above all pertinent to say that as one looks back over the years' effort to build the organization, one wonders how the Foundation could have attained its present stature without the imagination and drive supplied by Major M. C. Migel and without the active backing of Helen Keller who put behind it all of the magic of her name.