[Colorado-Talk] Our History Project is making progress

[Peggy Chong]

Hello All:

 

Tonight I want to keep you all abreast of our progress for our Preservation
of Historical Documents (PHD) Committee.

 

We are at the hurry-up-and-wait stage right now, but in the next month, we
will be jumping! You read in The Blind Coloradan today how you can help, by
helping fund the project and volunteers later this fall.  We have made some
good progress in our funding, but have a long way to go.  

 

I am pasting below a press release that went out earlier this week about
funding received by NFBCO for our PHD project.  We all like to be on the
winning team.  Please circulate this press release to your local media to
bring attention to our efforts to preserve our blind Colorado history for
everyone in Colorado to research and learn the truth about blindness.
Encourage them to be part of our winning team.  

 

Peggy Chong

 

Saving Our History We Cannot Currently Read Ourselves

Colorado's Blind Receives

Funding For Phase Two

 

 

For Immediate Release

 

Denver, Colorado (August 3, 2020): Today The National Federation of the
Blind of Colorado (NFBCO) announced the receipt of a grant of $7,500 from
the American Action Fund for Blind Children and Adults, based in Baltimore,
Maryland  to support its on-going fundraising efforts for phase two of the
Preservation of the four-year, Historical Documents Project launched by the
NFBCO more than a year ago.  This and other funding have been sent to the
NFBCO at 2233 W. Shepperd Rd in Littleton.  

 

"After a water pipe break in a rarely-visited storage room at the Colorado
Center for the Blind (CCB) and NFBCO headquarters, we were surprised to find
our own history right under our noses" said Scott LaBarre, NFBCO State
President.  "Unfortunately, much of it was inaccessible to us."

 

"Too often Blindness research and historical documents, preserved in
libraries are from agencies for the blind, run by sighted people or medical
studies to learn how different blind people are from sighted people."
LaBarre added.  "In the national Federation of the Blind, we know we are not
different and will soon have excellent documentation from right here in
Colorado, from the blind leaders of the past to demonstrate to the newly
blinded and citizens of Colorado just how much alike we are." 

 

Old records are currently being scanned to preserve the records from future
handling during the preservation process.  Each file will be sent through an
Optical Character Recognition ((OCR) process, knowing that at least half of
the old records will not be recognized due to poor quality of the original
documents as well as handwritten records from as far back as 1915.

 

"Volunteers will transcribe the non OCR'ed files into Word documents that
can be read by screen readers used by the blind." said Peggy Chong, Chair of
the project.  "When all salvageable records have been transcribed, we will
have a fully accessible and searchable history of the blind in Colorado, as
told by the blind ancestors of our past."

 

"Do to the nature of our minority status, we do not have the ancestors of
the past to tell us the same old family stories over and over again as other
minorities and families have the luxury of hearing."  Chong continued.
Sadly, many of the records left behind from those who had families, were
tossed after their passing as their blind loved one left them in formats
such as New York Point or Braille that the sighted descendants could not
read.  What we have are sole-source, one-of-a-kind treasures rarely found
today, and certainly not in any public library anywhere in the country."  

 

"Blind pioneers of Colorado have paved the way for us, although many of
their stories are still unknown to us.  To have access to their experience
in their own words, their  challenges, triumphs and descriptions of
techniques they used to build their lives, careers and support their
families will inspire our students." said Julie Deden, Director of the
Colorado Center for the Blind.  "We look forward to encouraging our students
to research their blind ancestors in these files to build confidence and
re-enforce that they are not alone.

 

# # # #

 

About the National Federation of the Blind of Colorado

The National Federation of the Blind of Colorado is the oldest and largest
organization of blind Coloradans. The National Federation of the Blind knows
that blindness is not the characteristic that defines you or your future.
Every day we raise the expectations of blind people because low expectations
create obstacles between blind people and our dreams. You can live the life
you want; blindness is not what holds you back.

 

CONTACT

For information about this initiative please contact

Peggy Chong

chongpeggy10 at gmail.com <mailto:chongpeggy10 at gmail.com> 

303-745-0473

2233 W Shepperd RD

Littleton CO, 80120

 

 

 

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