SURVEY: Let us know what you think about the Visionary Voices website.
Interviews with leaders in Pennsylvania's Intellectual Disability
Movement.
A collection of historically significant archival documents.
A performance project to bring the stories to life.
A resource for students, teachers, scholars, people with disabilities, families, policymakers and the media.
introduction to visionary voices
View larger version of this introduction.
Visionary Voices Blog
Follow the links below for the full text of the Visionary Voices blog updates.
About this project
For more than 30 years, Pennsylvania has been a leader in public policy revision and creation regarding people with disabilities, serving as a model of for states across the country. The efforts of individuals—people with disabilities, their family members, legal professionals and others—have resulted in changes in education, institutionalization and self-determination.
In an effort to preserve this history and to develop a vital resource for people with disabilities, educators, policy makers and members of the media, Visionary Voices is collecting the stories and papers of Pennsylvanians who have played a significant role in policy reform, leading to greater freedom for people with disabilities.
The project is in two parts—recorded interviews and the collected papers of Dennis Haggerty. More about the project.
performs
Stories of people with disabilities will be the subject of a compelling new public performance.
The stories of people with disabilities, policy makers, family members—especially moms—and the story of Pennsylvania's Intellectual Disability Movement will be the subject of a compelling new public performance produced by the Institute on Disabilities, written by Suli Holum and directed by David Bradley.
Through the public performance part of Visionary Voices, the Institute hopes to bring serious and timely subject matter to the attention of new audiences, while reigniting the imagination and passion of the disability community.
archive
In 2008, Dennis Haggerty, a Philadelphia-based attorney, respected disability rights advocate, and parent of a child with an intellectual disability donated his personal papers to the Institute on Disabilities at Temple University. Dating back to 1970, Mr. Haggerty's correspondence, newspaper clippings, photos, and manuscripts document a movement that gave people with disabilities equal access to education, freed people with disabilities from institutions, and ultimately allowed people with disabilities to take their rightful place in the community.
The Haggerty Papers are permanently housed in Temple University's Urban Archives.
In addition, Select documents from the collection will soon be available for viewing.
finding aid
The Visionary Voices project has collaborated with archivists, librarians, historians, and technicians to preserve the Haggerty Papers and to create its finding aid. The project's long-term goal is to digitize the Haggerty Papers, making selections accessible to users worldwide.
