Two pygmy sperm whales that had become stranded on Mahia Beach in New Zealand were guided to safety by a bottlenose dolphin. Rescuers had tried to get the whales back into the sea, but the creatures were too disoriented in the shallow water to get their bearings. Just when it looked as if the whales would have to be euthanized to stop their suffering, a dolphin—nicknamed Moko by residents—apparently heard the whales’ cries for help, approached them, and guided them through a channel into deeper water. Marine biologist Anton van Helden said it was the first time he had ever heard of such an “inter-species” rescue.
A 120-year-old photograph of Helen Keller and her teacher, Anne Sullivan, has been found in a family album in Massachusetts. For decades, the photo belonged to Thaxter Spencer of Waltham, whose mother often stayed on Cape Cod. There, as a child in July 1888, she met and played with Keller. One of her relatives took the picture, and it surfaced when Spencer recently donated some belongings to the New England Genealogical Society. “It’s really one of the best images I’ve seen in a long, long time,” said Helen Selsdon, an archivist at the American Foundation for the Blind. “This is just a huge visual addition to the history of Helen and Annie.”
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