Author: Emily Moorey
The Heinz History Center's Detre Library and Archives takes great pride in preserving the history of Western Pennsylvania.Within the last few years, that has begun to include the history of Pittsburgh's disabled community. The disabled community has been silenced for decades with much of their history having been erased . By working to preserve these stories, the Heinz History Center is making space for this community to be heard. This effort is something that I’m grateful to participate in during the duration of my internship. My supervisor, Sierra Green, Senior Outreach Archivist, is one of the leading figures on this preservation effort alongside her other ongoing projects. These are collections that are telling the often-forgotten stories of members of the disability community and their families, giving them a voice that has often been taken away.
My participation in this project has included processing some of these collections into the archives, and handling these stories with care so that others may be able to see them too. The collections that I’ve processed have included photographs, IEP plans, activism efforts, biographical information, and more. When processing these collections I had to take great care in assuring that I am accurately depicting the stories of these individuals and their lives as part of my responsibility is to describe the historical context of the collection. Finding the proper words and way to organize the collections i a way that prioritizes the story of the disabled individual is arguably the most important part of this process outside of the actual preservation of these objects. In order to properly preserve these objects, all artifacts are stored in acid-free folders that are labelled in accordance to the story the collection tells. This often includes sorting the artifacts into related topic folders. Photographs, which are handled with gloves, were sorted into smaller envelopes to better preserve the photographs.
Two of the collections I have had the privilege to process include the Amy Selders Papers and Photographs and the Catherine and Melinda Feather Papers and Photographs. Amy Selders is a disabled woman who was a leading activist for Centers of Independent Living across the country to move disabled individuals out of nursing homes into suitable living spaces. Catherine Feather was the mother to Melinda Feather, a young girl with a disability who often faced challenges within the school system. Catherine devoted her life to ensuring her daughter the right to a proper education while also working to ensure the same rights for other children with disabilities. Without the Heinz History Center and Sierra Green’s efforts to preserve these stories, they may have been lost like many others before them.
Emily Moorey was a Museum Studies Intern at the Heinz History Center, Fall 2024