Letter to the Editor

Larry Nilsson, Red Wing

I enjoyed your article “Man remembered as very active” about the late Leroy Cornelius Van Proosdy. Despite struggling with stuttering, Mr. Van Proosdy certainly touched many lives. The article mentioned how he was able to sing fluently without stuttering. This phenomenon has never been fully explained, but many experts feel that since singing is a right brain function and speaking is a left brain function, there is no correlation between singing and speaking.

Of course, there are famous singers who have stuttered but are fluent when singing. Some of them are Mel Tillis, Marc Anthony, Carly Simon and Gareth Gates. These people and many more famous people from various fields are on the list of famous people who stutter on the website of the Stuttering Foundation (www.stutteringhelp.org). The website of this nonprofit organization also provides many free resources such as streaming videos, downloadable brochures, and a general wealth of information. One of the brochures is “Special Education Law and Children Who Stutter” that explains that every child in America has the guaranteed right to free speech therapy as has been mandated by federal law for 35 years.