Collections
DOCUMENTS COLLECTION
VISUAL STILLS COLLECTION
Building A Disability History Library
Our collections are designed to provide access to a rich variety of
primary documents useful for learning and teaching about the
historical experience of people with disabilities.
Our first goal has been to create a study collection. We do not strive
to be comprehensive. We look for artifacts that represent experiences
common to many people or groups with disabilities or that reflect a
genre of records. If a related collection of artifacts already exists
online (e.g., Social Security documents) we will refer you to it.
We work closely with archivists, scholars, and community groups
nationwide to identify and locate relevant materials. If you know of
materials that might be appropriate additions to this Library please
contact us by writing to
.
Because text documents are more complex to process digitally than
visual stills, the proportion of documents to visual stills in the
Library will generally be about 1 to 3.
The Documents Collection
Items in the Documents Collection touch on all aspects of American
life and history, both well-known and obscure. Some of our oldest
records are personal letters written by 19th-century parent advocates
looking for money to establish a school for their deaf children.
Magazine articles about workers with disabilities participating in the
labor force from the WWII era make it clear that women and African-Americans
weren't the only groups to have their expectations raised during the war.
We deliberately seek materials that reveal a wide range of
perspectives on the disability experience and that foster dialogue
about how disability has been represented and understood. We are
particularly interested in including first person accounts by people
with disabilities and materials that integrate with other social
developments and shifts in American culture.
The Visual Stills
Collection
The Visual Stills Collection contains images and other non-print
materials related to people with disabilities. We have included
children's book illustrations from Sunday School texts, 19th-century
family photographs, images of beggars, show business professionals,
and charity events, and postcard views of institutions.
Through all our collections, our primary concern is the social
experience of people with disabilities. We include something from
every genre. However, it is worth noting that although medical history
has produced vast numbers of images of people with disabilities, we
will not focus on this material except when it is pertinent to a
Museum exhibit or Education curriculum within the site.
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