North East Sensory Services (or NESS for short) was started in 1879 by William Ferguson of Kinmundy and his brother Thomas Ferguson, as the Aberdeen Town and County Association for Teaching the Blind at their Homes (the Association). The organisation was set up with the support of the Earl of Aberdeen, whose family stayed a patron of the organisation until the 2000s. The first Superintendent, Robert Meldrum, instrumental in setting up the Association and identifying the first 125 blind people that the Association was to support. Within the first few years, the organisation found itself delivering services to people in Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire, parts of Banffshire, Buchan, Orkney and Shetland.