Frank C. Laubach was an educator, missionary, and preacher who developed an international reputation for teaching illiterate people to read. His system used symbols to represent phonetic sounds. The Laubach system was first used in the Philippines between 1915-1936, when he was serving as a missionary. He co-authored more than 200 primers in more than 165 languages for illiterate adults. Governments of many countries sponsored his work. Laubach also developed written languages and alphabets in remote areas, where previously none existed.