The collection includes photographs of buildings and personnel.
In 1848, Michigan Governor Epaphroditus Ransom suggested that the Michigan State Legislature establish a school to educate people who were deaf and/or blind. Michigan Legislator Edward Hughes Thomson introduced a bill, later known as Act 187 of 1848. Thomson's proposal named the instutution the "Michigan Asylum for Educating the Deaf and Dumb and the Blind." The school officially opened in Flint, Michigan in 1854, with Reverend Barnabas Maynard Fay serving as its principal.
Change characterized the school's first century of existence. Its student body increased from approximately twelve students in 1854 to several hundred by the 1950s. Its first structure, Clarke Hall, was completed in 1856 and numerous other buildings—including those that facilitated vocational education—were built in the following decades. The school was later renamed the Michigan Institution for the Education the Deaf and Dumb and the Blind (1867) and—after its students who were blind were relocated to Lansing, Michigan—the Michigan School for the Deaf (1887). Additionally, the school's Board of Trustees, which had largely overseen the school and its staff since its founding, was abolished in 1921 and replaced with the State Institute Commission of the State Welfare Department. In 1937, the school was placed under the jurisdiction of Michigan's State Board of Education.
In 2013, a new building for the Michigan School for the Deaf building was completed. As of 2021, the Michigan School for the Deaf continues to provide students with a general education in both American Sign Language and English.
