World Braille Day is observed on January 4th each year to celebrate the birth of Louis Braille (born on January 4, 1809), the inventor of the Braille system of reading and writing for the blind and visually impaired.

Louis Braille developed the Braille system in 1824 when he was just 15 years old, after losing his own sight in childhood. His system uses patterns of raised dots arranged in a rectangular grid, with each character representing letters, numbers, or punctuation marks.

Braille revolutionized access to written information for blind and visually impaired people, enabling them to read, write, and engage with the world in a way that was previously inaccessible.