Willie Mae Goodman decided to send her daughter Marguerite to the Willowbrook State School when Marguerite was four years old. Marguerite was born with developmental disabilities, and doctors argued that Willowbrook was an appropriate place for her.
Conditions for Marguerite, and other children and adults at Willowbrook, were horrible. The facility drew criticism from Senator Robert Kennedy, who described it as “not fit for animals,” as Mrs. Goodman recalls.
Transcript: At school, when we interacted, initially, signing was not allowed, that we’d be punished if we used signing. We only signed when we knew the teachers weren’t looking. We hid our signs. But when we were outside of school, we used sign freely. When groups of us went on trips, we signed. So, for me, I didn’t sleep at the school. I commuted back and forth between home and school on the train and it was a lot of fun. When class was over, at 2:30, we couldn’t wait to get together and get on the train. You know, in New York City, we had an area where we would all meet that was well known, under the 14th Street train. We’d gather and converse and just have a great time. I enjoyed that so much. We didn’t have student clubs or groups, so that time at 14th Street was what we did. We met as a group and had a good time together. Also, we did have sports teams. They were run by Deaf clubs. So, interacting and spending time in that setting exposed me to many great things.
Judith (Judy) Heumann was one of tens of thousands of children who contracted polio during outbreaks in the late 1940s and early 1950s and became physically disabled. As a young girl, she received home instruction until her mother was able to get Judy enrolled at P.S. 219 in Queens when she was in the fourth grade. On her first day of school she rode with other children in a wheelchair-accessible bus. She met the paraprofessionals who would help her and other Disabled students get around the school, use the bathroom, and get physical, occupational, or speech therapy.1 She recalled that everyone in her class used braces or a wheelchair, and that they were taught in a basement classroom separated from the “kids upstairs”—the non-disabled students. Heumann’s special education class resembled the ungraded classes from the early 20th century, and included students aged 9-21.2 They were grouped together because of their physical access needs, in spite of their wide range of academic and social needs.
After Camp Jened closed in 1977, many former campers stayed connected to one another. The sense of community and possibility they built at camp became an inspiration and source of strength for the developing disability rights movement.1
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By the 1980s, Audre Lorde was working full-time as a writer. She had published essays and poetry. She had also been fighting cancer, which she was diagnosed with in 1978.
Mrs. Willie Mae Goodman heard many people speak of her daughter’s death. When she was an infant and a toddler, doctors encouraged Mrs. Goodman and her husband to place Marguerite in an institution. Her doctors predicted that Marguerite would not live beyond two years, and they told her parents that they could send her away.
In early 1979, the Board of Education decided to change the rules for private bus operators in a way that would have lowered wages for many drivers. More than 2,000 bus drivers went on strike for over 13 weeks.
Many major changes in education have come through federal legislation. The GI Bill of 1944 provided support for college tuition for former soldiers, many who would not have been able to afford it otherwise. Title IX of the Civil Rights Act led to the expansion of women’s access to sports in schools.
Marguerite Goodman lived at the Gouverneur Hospital in lower Manhattan. Her mother, Willie Mae Goodman, organized to improve Marguerite’s life at Gouverneur. This article by the New York Daily News identifies the many ways she and other family members of residents worked to change Gouverneur.
As institutions became more widespread, more parents sent their children with intellectual and developmental disabilities away, hoping they would be rehabilitated and come home. Many of them never did. New York built five institutions for Disabled people, starting in 1855 with a state school in Syracuse, and followed by schools in Rome, Newark, and Letchworth Village. The city also operated an “Idiot School” or “Asylum” on Randall’s Island.
The late 1960s and early 1970s saw campus activism around the United States, for social change and against the Vietnam War. In New York City, students at various campuses of the City University of New York organized and protested in ways that changed their colleges and universities in the late 1960s and early 1970s. At City College, students organized a takeover of the campus demanding admission of more Black and Latinx students to the predominantly white campus in Harlem. At Brooklyn College, students pushed successfully for the founding of programs in Africana Studies and Puerto Rican Studies.1
Bayard Rustin was born in West Chester, Pennsylvania, on March 12, 1912. He was raised by his maternal grandmother, who was an active member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Because of her activism, Bayard engaged in protests against racial discrimination at a very young age. After spending time at Wilberforce College and Cheyney State Teachers College, Rustin moved to New York City in 1937. He began attending classes at City College and he became part of a radical network of activists and organizers. Through this network, he met and worked alongside Ella Baker, A. Philip Randolph, and others. Randolph quickly noticed Rustin’s talent for organizing demonstrations. In 1941, Randolph enlisted Rustin to organize a demonstration at the United States Capitol against segregation in the armed forces and racial discrimination in employment. The pressure from this proposed march compelled President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to sign an executive order that prohibited racial and ethnic discrimination in the nation’s defense industry, which was very active as World War II was underway.
Located near the town of Hunter, New York, in the Catskill Mountains (a few hours from New York City), Camp Jened was unusual at the time for its focus on Disabled campers.1
The grounds of Camp Jened included a river, a lake with a dock for boating and places to row, swimming facilities, and a stream that was great for fishing.1 Camp Jened also had a large grassy field where campers and counselors gathered to play baseball.
Organizing in the early 1960s by the Citywide Committee on Integration and by Reverend Milton Galamison had increased public attention to the “600” schools. After newspaper coverage of misconduct by teachers and administrators at a “600” school in Brooklyn, as well as criticism over the schools being racially segregated, the Board of Education created a special committee to study conditions inside these schools. After two years of study, the report, “‘600’ Schools Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow," was delivered to the superintendent of schools in September 1966. The report acknowledged that the “600” schools were “ethnically unbalanced” and attributed this imbalance to the “many social problems and pressures to which these children are exposed,” rather than “mental illness.” While acknowledging that many problems existed within the “600” school system, the committee also highlighted the strengths of the program and the number of students who moved through the system, many of whom were considered “rehabilitated” and returned to the regular school system. They cited a need for more funding, personnel, and training to address the problems and improve the system.
The 1965 boycott targeted segregation in New York City’s junior high schools and “600” schools. But for 2000 students - primarily Black and Puerto Rican boys - who attended the “600” day schools, those schools were places they were sent because they were labeled by the schools as “socially maladjusted” or “emotionally disturbed.” Some of the students had been ordered to attend these schools after interactions with the police and the juvenile legal system. Most students did not find a supportive educational environment there, and those who had disabilities did not receive the support they needed.
In the fall of 1964, months after the massive February 1964 boycott, Reverend Milton Galamison and the Citywide Committee on Integration launched another boycott. Galamison and the Citywide Committee - which included CORE (Congress On Racial Equality), Parents’ Workshop for Equality in New York Schools, Harlem Parents’ Committee, EQUAL, and the Negro Teachers Association - focused on the city’s junior high schools and the “600” schools, which had inadequate facilities, no curriculum, untrained teachers, and improperly screened students. The groups’ demands included promoting many more Black and Puerto Rican teachers to leadership positions like school principal, desegregating junior high schools, and improving the “600” schools. Reverend Galamison was arrested for violating state education laws by “encouraging truancy” when young people stayed out of school to boycott.
Camp Jened was a private camp, and it charged campers’ families for attendance. Founders Leona Burger and Honora Rubenstein reported that they kept the fees as low as possible. But not everyone could afford to pay these fees.1
For Camp Jened to be accessible to Disabled children and adults, staff and counselors had to work well with campers. Some of the staff at Camp Jened were disabled themselves, but all received training in how to support Disabled youth and adults.1
