After his release from the notorious institution, Roland Johnson became a renowned intellectual disabilities advocate. It is time for his story to be better known.
Roland Johnson was an unlikely hero who played a pivotal role in the long struggle for disability rights and freedom in Pennsylvania and America.
When he first saw the sprawling 1,200-acre compound, complete with a dairy farm and agricultural fields and more than 3,500 residents, he started to cry. As an “inmate,” Johnson’s official records bore the patient number 9134, and with an IQ assessed at 53, he was one of the so-called working boys assigned to labor in the cafeteria, or one of the several shops or fields.
While at Pennhurst, Johnson not only witnessed but experienced neglect, mistreatment, and corporal punishment for his noncompliance.found upwards of 60 residents in dayrooms, many in soiled garments, wandering about with no direction or purposeful activities; infants were left manacled to their cribs and severely malnourished. Nighttime was the worst, Johnson recalled in his book, with few guards on duty and predators free to roam the halls at will.
With the assistance of dedicated mentors, Johnson evolved into a prophetic public speaker and self-advocate for people with intellectual or developmental disabilities. The once shy and awkward cast-off championed closing state-run institutions for the disabled. His experiences at Pennhurst gave Johnson a depth of insight into the problems of institutionalization, and an authority and authenticity that was recognized by leaders of the disability rights and civil rights movements.
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