Author: Kenney, Alice P.

Publication Year: 1979

Media Type: Book

Summary:

This work deals in making museums and other historical organizations programs and facilities accessible to disabled persons. The American Association for State and Local History has been aware for some time of the anxiety among small museums and historical organizations concerning their responsibility for making their programs available to disabled persons. Although that became a legal as well as a moral obligation with the passage of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, its practical implications were not spelled out until the issuance of guidelines for compliance with Section 504 of that act by various federal agencies, including the National Endowment for the arts in 1979.

Abstract:

This work deals in making museums and other historical organizations programs and facilities accessible to disabled persons. The American Association for State and Local History has been aware for some time of the anxiety among small museums and historical organizations concerning their responsibility for making their programs available to disabled persons. Although that became a legal as well as a moral obligation with the passage of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, its practical implications were not spelled out until the issuance of guidelines for compliance with Section 504 of that act by various federal agencies, including the National Endowment for the arts in 1979.

Since these guidelines require that recipients of federal funds make their programs accessible to handicapped persons within three years, the question of how best to do so has become urgent. Many small museums and historical organizations are concerned about accomplishing structural modifications within the limits of their resources and program adaptations within the time their staff can spare from many other duties.

They are also confused by conflicts between the requirement to provide access for disabled persons and that of preserving the integrity of historic structures laid down by the Historic Preservation Act of 1966. Nevertheless, some organizations have been tackling the problem and have accumulated experience that may be helpful to others.

The author of this book is a historian and educator who has developed a special interest in improving the accessibility of historic sites through a number of years of doing research in museums from a wheelchair. Interest generated by her articles on this subject prompted the Lehigh County (Pennsylvania) Historical Society to sponsor her proposal for a survey of museum accessibility to disabled persons in sixteen counties of southeastern Pennsylvania.

Funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, a federal agency, between 1977 and 1979, Museum Access studied facilities and programs at eighty-five museums, more than half of them in historic buildings. Its final report, Hospitable Heritage, was distributed to participants and to many others outside the project area who requested it. Since requests for it have outrun the supply, the most important of its contents have been incorporated in the present volume. Permission to use these copyrighted materials from the Lehigh County Historical Society and the National Endowment for the Humanities is greatly appreciated.|In planning this book, it became clear that the experience of a single region with a distinctive cultural tradition might not be fully applicable to the circumstances of historical organizations elsewhere.|A survey questionnaire was therefore mailed to 750 member organizations of the American Association for State and Local History. Some of the considerable proportion who replied reported very interesting accommodations for disabled visitors, while others indicated the aspects of the subject on which they most needed information. Further correspondence with a number of them contributed many valuable insights, which, it is hoped, will be helpful to others.

It is hoped that this book will be useful not only to staff members of small museums and historical organizations, but to the board members and volunteers who contribute so much to their programs. It may assist them in completing the self-evaluation required by the Section 504 guidelines and to discover many adjustments that can be put into practice with very little effort. It will also give them some basis for consultation with disabled individuals and groups and for training staff and volunteers to meet their needs. When these adaptations have been accomplished, it may suggest ways of making the unavoidable structural modifications within the limits of the organization's resources.

In the process some administrators may well find, as have their counterparts in many other museums and historical organizations, that accommodations designed to benefit disabled persons increase the organization's effectiveness in interpreting the historic heritage of the community to their entire audience.

CONTENTS
Preface.

1. Only worried a lot.
    How do you define disability?
    I don't know what Section 504 is.
    We hadn't really thought much about it.

2. Things we can do right now.
    A board of directors that supports such efforts.
    Many things we do are just common sense.
    I need some feedback.

3. We don't have many special programs.
    We are doing our utmost to have as few inaccessible areas as possible.
    We are working to increase the scope of our communication.
    The basic premise is Don't hover.

4. Good ethics, good public relations, good business. 
    Guided according to their capacity.
    We might be able to develop a program...if we could generate financial support.
    This is their world, too.

Appendix:
     A. The law.
     B. Tabulations of survey responses.
     C. Representative programs at historical organizations.
For further reading.
Index.

Arts & Intersections:

Categories: Accessibility