Tongue Tied
In 1970, Deacon began to write his autobiography with three friends. Ernie Roberts (who also had cerebral palsy), had been in hospital since the age of ten, and was able to understand Deacon's speech. Roberts listened to Deacon's dictation and repeated it to another patient, Michael Sangster, who wrote it down in longhand. After proof-reading by Chris Ring, a student who visited the team each week, it was typed by a fourth member of the team, Tom Blackburn, who was initially unable to read or write but taught himself to type in order to help. The forty-four page book took fourteen months to write. BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour ran a feature on Joey and his manuscript and the resulting publicity led to the BBC TV documentary.
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