In 1971, Winifred Thiltgen, a retired special education teacher, and a few of her friends, began making tactile reading and math readiness books to donate to visually impaired and blind children attending Santa Rosa, California schools. The books were so well received that within a year they were being donated to numerous schools in many Northern California counties.

By 1980, Winifred Thiltgen was speaking to the National Braille Association and state teacher conventions in Sacramento. New volunteers were recruited and financial donations were received from service organizations in the Oakmont Active Adult community where she lived. The group worked tirelessly with teachers of blind and visually impaired children to develop more book titles. Demand for these free, hand-made books spread beyond Northern California to states across the US and as far away as Canada, Guam, Indonesia, and Japan.

Today, the Oakmont Visual Aids Workshop offers 38 titles to choose from and ships free world-wide.