[Music]
[Logo: Ampers, with tagline: Diverse Radio for Minnesota’s Communities.]
[Photo: Margot Imdieke Cross]
Margot Imdieke Cross: I don’t remember walking. In my dreams, I walk.
[Logo: Ampers, with taglines: Diverse Radio for Minnesota’s Communities, and Keep Moving Forward.]
Host: This is Keep Moving Forward.
[Photo: President George H.W. Bush signs the Americans with Disabilities Act into law. Photo courtesy of the George Bush Presidential Library.]
George H.W. Bush: Let the shameful wall of exclusion finally come tumbling down.
[Logos: ADA 25: Americans with Disabilities Act, 1990-2015, and Disability Rights Are Civil Rights. Logos courtesy of the ADA National Network, www.adata.org.]
Host: Exploring the legacy and promise of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
[Photos: Margot Imdieke Cross]
Margot Imdieke Cross: Margot Imdieke Cross is my name. I’m an accessibility specialist, which means that I work with a lot of contractors, a lot of designers, a lot of people with disabilities on access issues.
What my disability is, is a spinal cord injury. I was injured in a farming accident when I was about a year and a half. I was just a really small kid.
The greatest thing about my family is that there weren’t a lot of allowances made. I remember one time I was going off to the rock pile, and one my front casters fell off. And so my brother turned to me, and he said, “Well, then you’re gonna have to pop a wheelie out to the –” and I said, “I don’t –,” and he said, “Well, then you better learn.” And so it wasn’t like, you know, “Oh, my gosh, let’s help you,” it’s like, “Okay, you figure it out. What are you gonna do?”
And to this day I am one of the best wheelie poppers.
[Logos: the Minnesota Council on Disability, the Minnesota Humanities Center, the Minnesota Arts & Cultural Heritage Fund, and the Ampers radio station.]
Host: Keep Moving Forward is supported by the Minnesota Council on Disability, the Minnesota Humanities Center, and the Minnesota Arts & Cultural Heritage Fund, online at Ampers.org.