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In 1997, WISH-TV secretly filmed resident abuse by employees inside New Castle State Developmental Center in New Castle, Indiana. The impact of making the disturbing, hidden camera footage public was the closure of the Center in 1998. Channel 8, the…

In 1997, WISH-TV secretly filmed resident abuse by employees inside New Castle State Developmental Center in New Castle, Indiana. The impact of making the disturbing, hidden camera footage public was the closure of the Center in 1998. Channel 8, the…

"I must be completely honest - I was not the first person to introduce the Americans with Disabilities Act," retired U.S. Senator Tom Harkin pointed out in an interview with the Indiana Disability History Project. In fact, Senator Harkin had been one…

“They asked me to work on the objective of developing an Arc in every county in Indiana,” says Don Melloy. Don would take off after to work to travel around the state meeting with parents and community members. He would discuss the benefits of…

“You don’t have the right to deny them the opportunity to try this.” Mary Lou Melloy's daughter, Cindy, was born in 1958. Doctors told the family they should put Cindy in a residential facility. Mary Lou and her husband, Don, had other plans for…

“It changed my life,” explains Karen Vaughn of her experience going through Partners in Policymaking in 1992. A leadership training program for adults with disabilities and parents, Partners in Policymaking had been recently initiated by the Indiana…

The second annual Central Indiana Invitational Wheelchair Games took place on April 28 and 29, 1979 at Carmel High School, north of Indianapolis. Events in swimming, weightlifting, field sports (including javelin, discus, shot put, and club throw),…

When talking about services in the ‘60s and ‘70s, Margaret Blome says, “There was very little available for people with multi-handicaps.” Margaret did find a therapist at Crossroads Rehabilitation Center in Indianapolis who worked with her daughter,…

"In every state and territory in the country there is what is called P & A, which is short for Protection and Advocacy System. So every state is required to have a designated agency that serves as the state's P&A, who is there to protect and…

This photograph shows a blind Works Progress Administration (WPA) worker operating a Braille machine at the Indiana State Library in Indianapolis. The photo, from the collection of the National Archives and Records Administration, was taken between…