The Local History Museum, So Near and Yet So Far

Author(s): Catherine Kudlick

Source: The Public Historian, Vol. 27, No. 2 (Spring 2005), pp. 75-81
Published by: University of California Press on behalf of the National Council on Public History
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/tph.2005.27.2.75 .
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Viewpoint

The Local History Museum,

So Near and Yet So Far
Catherine Kudlick

The author, a historian with a vision impairment, and her blind companion decide spon-
taneously to visit a local history museum. Instead of either a docent or an audio guide,
they find staff who appear unaware of present-day means for providing access to people
with disabilities in public places. The author shows how access through universal design
benefits not only people with disabilities, but everyone.

One saturday afternoon while on vacation in a major American city, a

friend and I made the mistake of acting like typical tourists; we tried to ad lib.
Without a master plan for spending our day, doing as any semi-sophisticated
tourists might do, we headed to the concierge desk of our hotel and sought
advice. We were a little nervous about visiting a new place, but also excited,
approaching the task of navigating through our day with a spirit of adventure.
For neither of us was a typical tourist.
“Let’s see,” the concierge told us, looking nervously first at my friend’s white
cane and then at my eyes, which appeared unusual to him, especially through
the thick bifocal lenses I wore. “We have tours of the local stadium; there’s a
city tour, but it just left; then there’s the Fine Arts Museum. . . .” His voice
trailed off as if he were struggling with the faux pas he thought he’d commit-
ted by reminding the blind of what they couldn’t see. “Oh, and there’s the lo-
cal history museum,” he said.
We brightened, imagining a place where there was sure to be a lot of ver-
bal content. I’m a history professor and, like my friend, enjoy local history
75

The Public Historian, Vol. 27, No. 2, pp. 75–81 (Spring 2005). ISSN: 0272-3433,
electronic ISSN 1533-8576.
© 2005 by The Regents of the University of California and the
National Council on Public History. All rights reserved.
Please direct all requests for permission to photocopy or reproduce article content through the
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76 ■ THE PUBLIC HISTORIAN

museums, which are rich in detail and local color. In fact, I like them better
than other museums because often they have an air of dusty authenticity and
tell you all kinds of things that might not make it into textbooks. And usually
they aren’t very stuffy about letting visitors touch their objects. They allow
you to get up close to see them, something that visitors with a significant vi-
sual impairment appreciate. In addition, the people who work in local history
museums can often barely contain their enthusiasm, which makes them find
creative ways of bringing the exhibits to life. Such employees seem to live the
history they are charged with preserving; they are delighted to bring you into
their world, and excited at the prospect of doing it in a different way.
As soon as we walked in the door of this museum, however, we had a sink-
ing feeling that the particular museum we’d selected might not be such a place.
“Do you have provisions for people who are blind or visually impaired?”
my friend asked at the ticket counter.
“I’m afraid all of that has to be arranged in advance,” the woman answered,
handing us a brochure whose small print presumably said as much.
“How much in advance?” I wanted to know.
“I don’t know exactly, it says something in there. But the disability discount
is fifty percent.”
We stared, not wanting to let her off the hook with a financial fix. Clearly
this backfired, because she immediately came back with, “Or I can even let
you in for free. Go see for yourself if you think it’s worth it.”
“Then I guess we’d get exactly what we paid for, wouldn’t we?” my friend
muttered into my ear. Turning to the clerk, he asked, “Before we do that, is
there any chance we could get a volunteer, someone to take us around and
read the signs?”
“No, we don’t have volunteers on Saturday, and during the week I’m afraid
you’d have to call ahead to book them. Like I keep telling you, it’s right there
in the pamphlet.”
“Look,” my friend said, growing impatient. “Neither of us can read the pam-
phlet. Besides, we couldn’t even have gotten it until we came here, so how
could we possibly know to book ahead?”
“Well, I guess it’s your duty to be informed,” the woman said, turning away
from us to sell tickets to a family of patrons who had just arrived.
My friend’s pain registered palpably as he replied, “In fact, we couldn’t
have even gone to the Internet; the computers in the hotel business office
don’t have ways for us to use them. I use speech software that allows the com-
puter to talk,” he explained, as if giving this account for the umpteenth time.
“And my friend here uses a program that magnifies the screen.”
By this point I wanted to give up, but my friend, more experienced in such
battles, refused to yield. “What about an audio tour on a cassette?” he per-
sisted.
The ticket clerk acted vague, demonstrating no clear desire to find out any-
thing further. Turning half away as if to indicate a growing desire to be rid of
us, she said, “There might be one for sale in the museum store.”
 VIEWPOINT ■ 77

In a stage whisper, I asked my friend if he thought such matters were cov-

ered by the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act). I admit that I felt angry
and wanted to put the employee in her place by parading the law in front of
her. But part of me genuinely wasn’t sure what rights, if any, we had in this
situation. Moreover, I couldn’t decide if I preferred an indifferent clerk or a
downright hostile one.
My friend sighed. “Spontaneity’s always the first thing to go when you’ve
got a disability. Not even the good old ADA could guarantee our right to that.”
“It’s not my fault,” the clerk replied unsympathetically. “You should have
called ahead. We’re just a small museum, you know.”
I looked around at the big posh new building of glass and cement. It seemed
very empty, almost eerily so for a Saturday in the middle of winter. Why was
there money to construct such a magnificent building and not for the people
who used it?
We headed across the polished floor to the bookstore, empty except for
two young women behind the counter. They were chatting about a new ad-
dition to their inventory, a coloring book for children.
“Hi,” I said. “The woman at the ticket counter told us that you might sell
audio tours of the museum. Is that true?”
“Nope!” one of them said with an unmistakable hint of triumph in her voice.
The young women struck me as very connected to museum culture but
not very interested in history. I imagined them sitting in one of my large sur-
vey classes doing their nails or reading the student newspaper waiting for an
hour of boredom to end.
My friend, a New Yorker now living in California, stiffened. Loaded for
bear, he approached what had now become an ordeal, as if we stood at the
OK Corral, facing off for a duel.
Anticipating his thoughts, I jumped in with: “Lots of museums across the
country and around the world have audio tours these days.” Behind my words
were memories of recent trips to wonderfully accessible museums like the
Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History and the Cité des Sci-
ences et de l’Industrie in Paris, both places where accessibility was an inte-
gral part of the design of the museums and the way exhibits were conceived.
The Smithsonian had recently experimented with an accessible information
kiosk and the Cité des Sciences had tactile models and raised-line drawings
to illustrate key scientific concepts to everyone. Or there was the newly re-
furbished museum at the Perkins School for the Blind in Watertown, Mass-
achusetts, that went beyond Braille labeling and tactile exhibits; it offered au-
dio wands and a fascinating wireless sound-emitting system that, much like a
spotlight, “shines” sound into the area immediately in front of an exhibit that
cannot be heard elsewhere. Visiting such places filled us not just with hope
but with expectations.
“Whatever,” I heard one of the young women say, wholly uninterested in
this aspect of the museum experience and equally oblivious to our need for
customer service.
78 ■ THE PUBLIC HISTORIAN

“Well, at the very least you might want to tell your boss or supervisor that
we came in asking about an alternative way to see the museum,” I said.
I imagined the women thinking, “The world works just fine as it is, so what
are these people complaining about? Besides, the store obviously didn’t have
anything for the blind, so why didn’t they just leave and take their bitterness
with them?”
As my friend and I stood there contemplating our next move, one of the
women, apparently taking pity on us, said, “You might want to try the Edu-
cation Division.”
“Where’s that?” I asked.
“It’s over there.” Since I saw no arm or hand movement, I assumed she
must have gestured with her eyes or head, still unaware that neither of us could
see her well enough to make use of subtle movement.
“How about being more specific?” my friend asked, his fur clearly up. “Re-
member, you’re talking to a couple of people who don’t see well, so please ex-
plain exactly where you mean.” I fluctuated between wanting to drag him out
and seeking to egg him on.
“Go out the door, and turn left,” the woman said in a voice growing more
and more surly. Clearly, we had more than overstayed our welcome.
As we started out the door, I stopped and turned back toward her. “It’s Sat-
urday. Will they be open today?”
“Nope, I guess not,” came the reply.
My friend and I stood there speechless. Whether out of cluelessness or ma-
liciousness, this woman had been fully prepared to send us on a wild goose
chase. We felt utterly and completely defeated, not to mention disillusioned
with the whole idea of taking part in civic culture. Perhaps we were simply
asking too much by showing up unannounced at a museum in the first place.

Why is it that when America seems eager to open its civic places to the broad-
est possible audience, certain public institutions appear so ill-informed about
people who require alternative ways to fully participate? Here we are, at a
time when the ADA has been in effect for over a decade, people with dis-
abilities have seen the promise of increased social awareness and powerful
technology, and a generation of people like the women in the museum have
grown up in large urban centers pouring money into their civic places. And
yet in the early twenty-first century, two people still couldn’t visit this mu-
seum on the spur of the moment or at the very least encounter employees
sensitized enough to treat them with anything but contempt. Why is it that
some people view visitors like us as problems rather than as opportunities to
present exhibitions in new and interesting ways?

Thwarted in our attempts to visit the history museum and disturbed by hav-
ing been forced to come off as troublemakers, we headed for the fine arts mu-
seum across the street. The previous encounter had rattled me, and my friend
now felt self-conscious waltzing in there with a white cane. Remembering the
 VIEWPOINT ■ 79

hotel concierge’s discomfort when mentioning the Fine Arts Museum option,
I created an imaginary dialogue we might have had if everyone got to ask what
they really wanted to know, a dialogue stripped of all politeness, one that I’d
share with all patrons as we strolled in:
Concierge: Why should blind people want to look at art? What would you
get out of it, anyway? And besides, wouldn’t it be depressing, since you can’t
really see it?
CK: Believe it or not, to a certain degree, aesthetics is important to all
people, including those with low vision and blindness. Besides, only a small
percentage of us have been totally blind since birth; many retain the ability
to see some color or light. Those blinded later in life still possess a well-stocked
visual memory bank that enables them to approach the world in a profoundly
visual way. With good verbal descriptions we can get as much—and some-
times even more—out of museums than many fully sighted patrons. Take me
as an example. I’m one of the most visual people I know, because I’ve never
taken my vision for granted, while a lot of my sighted friends have never been
forced to ask themselves what it means to see.
Concierge: What am I supposed to think or do when I see a blind person
in a museum? Frankly, you people make me nervous. I see those canes, and
I’m sure you’re lost or you’re going to run into something.
CK: Believe me, any blind people who have bothered to set foot in a mu-
seum have gone through an extensive reasoning and logistical process to get
there, so chances are they plan on getting something out of it. And if they get
lost or run into something, there’s usually somebody right there to help. (I
can’t resist adding that if you’re lost and happen to see a blind person walk-
ing by, they’re probably the best people to ask for directions: more often than
not, they know exactly where they are and will give a clear, detailed descrip-
tion of where to go.) So relax! The blind person isn’t a creature from another
planet.
Concierge: But how do I know if you need anything? I can’t just stand there
and watch you be lost! Like the other day. I tried to help this guy cross the
street by taking his arm and walking him to the other side. I thought he’d be
grateful, but he started screaming at me.
CK: You probably scared him to death by seeming to come out of nowhere!
Never grab anybody without saying hello first and asking if it’s okay to lend a
hand. It’s just as it is with anyone: we all have need for autonomy. If you want
to know something, ask.
Concierge: But what if I say the wrong thing? All disabled people seem so,
well, touchy. I’m constantly afraid of hurting someone’s feelings or not being
politically correct.
CK: Just be open to learning and laughing. If you don’t know what to say,
try saying that! One of the best encounters I ever had was with a stranger who
said: “Sorry, but I’ve never been around a blind person before, so I’ll take my
cues from you, okay?” Blind or sighted, we all want the same thing: to be
treated naturally and with dignity.
80 ■ THE PUBLIC HISTORIAN

At the ticket counter of the Fine Arts Museum my friend and I learned that
we had struck pay dirt: every exhibit was now accessible because of an ex-
periment being conducted about the feasibility of audio tours for all patrons,
regardless of visual acuity. With joy in our hearts we picked up the last audio
guide from a large, now-empty rack. Alas, heartbreak! It didn’t work.
Fortunately, a museum employee was on hand to help. Realizing that we
might not see when the next available machine came back and that a sighted
patron might snap it up before we had a chance, he stayed with us until one
became available. Handing it to us, he said, “Actually, I’m glad you’re here.
You’ve just made me aware that this process could turn into a free-for-all when
this place gets crowded.”
We thoroughly enjoyed the museum. Although we had to wait several min-
utes until one of the other patrons finished using an audio-guide, in order to
partake of a full museum experience, we took comfort in the fact that the world
was indeed beginning to change.
When we returned the audio guide to the rack, the helpful employee came
up to us and asked, “What did you think of the descriptions of our exhibits?”
“I thought they created a wonderful verbal picture of the art,” I said, “and
I appreciated the historical context.”
“I liked that too,” my friend added. “But you know what really struck me?
I’ve listened to a lot of these audio tours, and this is one of the first times I’ve
ever heard one with navigation instructions.” He shook his head, as if he
couldn’t believe it himself. “I always knew right where I was, right down to
which painting was in front of me. I think I could have even managed to do
the exhibit without any sighted help.”
“Isn’t it amazing!” I exclaimed, as we headed out of the museum and into
the afternoon cold at the end of what could only be described as a bittersweet
day. “We’ve actually arrived! Now everyone—even sighted people—wants au-
dio description, so we’re at last fighting on grounds of equality.” I smiled as I
remembered our visit to Ellis Island a few years before, when a herd of sighted
tourists stampeded past us to lay their hands on the highly-acclaimed audio
guides. It felt great to be part of the mainstream.

Postscript: A year or so after the museum visits described above, I taught an

undergraduate history class at the University of California, Davis whose cul-
minating project was putting together a museum exhibit on the history of nor-
mality in America. Since the students had read a lot about disability history,
I urged them to think carefully about access issues when they designed their
exhibit. Though it would never be perfect, everyone agreed that the best way
to make the exhibit accessible to blind people would be to create a video tour
with embedded audio description and a few key tactile objects.
After the course was over, three students dropped by my office to chat. “The
hardest but best part was making that tape,” one of them said, with the others
agreeing. “That’s when the whole thing came together for me. We really had
to step back and think what the exhibit was all about.”
 VIEWPOINT ■ 81

Naturally, I felt very pleased. We chatted more, and inevitably the topic of
their futures came up. “So what happens now after graduation?” I asked.
All of them laughed nervously. “You go through all these years of school,
then you just feel kind of dumped out into the world,” one said. “I mean, there
just aren’t any jobs out there for history majors.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” I said with a mischievous smile. “I can think of one
or two museums where you could begin making a huge difference.”

Catherine J. Kudlick is professor of history at the University of California, Davis.

She is the author with Zina Weygand of Reflections: the Life and Writings of a Young Blind
Woman in Post-Revolutionary France and most recently of “Disability History: Why We
Need Another ‘Other’” (American Historical Review, June 2003).

Special thanks to Tony Candela, who in many ways was my co-author.