Herb Goldberg's Acceptance Speech

For The Hall Of Fame honor and plaque at the National Stuttering Project Convention in Atlanta, Georgia, June 25-27, 1998.

Herb started out with some pseudo (fake) stuttering. Then went on with the following:

After Oliver Bloodstein spoke of pseudo stuttering yesterday, I just had to do that. There is a piece on pseudo stuttering in my handout. You may want to take a shot at it.

So today I am a big man on campus, and I greatly appreciate the honor. But I am not the one, I am a messenger. At the ASHA (American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Convention in San Francisco in 1979, three young men who stutter, John Ahlbach, Michael Sugarman, and Bob Goodman, gave a presentation about the formation of The National Stuttering Project, our NSP.

They were almost kicked out of the convention for suggesting they start a data base of referrals to practitioners who are comfortable dealing with people who stutter. Now Jane Fraser of the Stuttering Foundation does this as well.

If it wasn't for the persistence of these men, we would not have our NSP today - and ASHA now has a Clinical Specialty Board.

We are not here to cure your stuttering, we are here to help you accept your stuttering, do what you can to help yourself, and to enter as much into the life style of a normal speaker as you are able.

Again, thank you very, very much. I just wish my Mom and Dad were here to see me today."

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added July 7, 1998