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Wagons to Waivers - Segment 4: Hail to the Chief

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Reba McEntire: Despite the best efforts of parents

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in Oklahoma and across the nation,

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the demand for institutional services continued.

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With only two sate-run facilities in our state,

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overcrowding and insufficient funding contributed

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to harsh living conditions at the facilities.

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These same problems were plaguing institutions

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all over the country.

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Disabilities affect all kinds of families,

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and sometimes it takes the right families at the right time

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to create significant change.

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In 1961, President John F. Kennedy set in motion

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events that would change the way the nation viewed,

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and treated, people with mental retardation.

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Not widely known was the fact that his family included

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a sister with that condition.

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With the urging and support of another of his sisters,

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Eunice Kennedy Shriver, Kennedy created

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the President's Panel on Mental Retardation.

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The President's Panel issued a report

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with ninety-five broad recommendations.

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They recommended the downsizing of the nation's institutions,

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and the expansion of community services.

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Many of the recommendations of the President's Panel

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would be enacted the following year with public law 88-156,

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the Maternal And Child Health

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And Mental Retardation Planning amendments.

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In just three short years,

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one of the first major pieces of legislation impacting

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people with intellectual disabilities was enacted.

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Through her efforts to start Special Olympics,

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and her advocacy on the Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. Foundation,

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Eunice Shriver brought attention to people with intellectual disabilities,

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and saw to it they were no longer ignored.

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The advocacy of the Kennedy family led Americans

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to not only change its policies on the care

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and the treatment of people with mental retardation,

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but they also help change the general perception of this population.

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By the early 60's, the Oklahoma Department

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of Mental Health and Retardation

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was serving nearly two thousand people

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at Enid and Paul's Valley state schools.

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Because these two facilities were bursting at the seams,

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the department responded to the overcrowding

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by starting construction on a third institution,

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this one on the banks of the Arkansas River in Sand Springs.

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It was named the Hissom Memorial Center,

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because the land it was built on had been donated

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by Mr. and Mrs. Wiley E. Hissom.

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Even though this facility was to be smaller than the other two,

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and licensed for only five hundred beds,

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the state still ran out of money before finishing construction.