(dramatic piano music)
- When I think of Winnifred I think of a
powerful woman, a woman who didn't take no for an answer,
a woman who was gonna do whatever she needed to have her
son have a place in this world.
- She was on a mission and nothing
was going to stop her.
- But it's amazing that this can come from
a woman from Edmonton who just wanted to help her kid.
(dramatic violin music)
- I think Winnifred Stewart's lesson is if people tell you
no about your child you're gonna-- you don't always have to
accept the establishment answer of no and sometimes when
you're Winnifred Stewart you're gonna change the world.
(lighthearted piano music)
- Joey shows that there's no reason for people developmental
disabilities to not be included in communities.
- Joey was born in 1963, he was the 12th child.
It would have been overwhelming for my mom to find-
to take care of all the kids as well as to be
concerned about Joey and his future.
Without the Winnifred Stewart Association, Joey would
not have had the education he had so he had 12 years of
education there, which he loved to go every day to,
to participate in.
- [Interviewer] What school did you go to Joey?
- Winnifred School
- Winnifred Stewart.
- Stewart yeah.
- Good.
(music)
- Winnifred was born in 1908 in Fernie, B.C., and she
moved to Edmonton, she married her husband Duncan,
and she moved here, she was a Registered Nurse,
and she worked as a nurse for several years,
until her son Parker was born in 1934.
He was born with what we call Down syndrome, we call that
now, back then they called it mongoloid or retarded.
In 1934 and even into the '50's, if your child was born with
Down syndrome, they said it's an idiot, he'll never learn
anything, it's best to institutionalize them and even some
cases in the United States they were also advocating-
allowing the child to die.
At the time Parker was alive and into the '50's and the
'60's he would have been steralized,
cause the government did not want these children to
pass on their genes to future generations.
- If I was in Winnifred's position, being told that your
child had to be institutionalized, I wouldn't let it
happen as a parent, and I think that's why,
one of the reasons why she fought so hard.
- When I worked in an institution that it was a better
environment than most and that's because of the people that
I worked with and who we were and where we were at that
point in time, but we would get children come in to the
institution that I worked in that came from facilities
that didn't have that.
I remember working with two young boys, a four year old and
a six year old, and the first probably week or two that they
were there, I couldn't approach them because there was fear,
there was fear of adults.
- This is what Winnifred Stewart and a lof of parents at the
time were pushing against saying, "no I see my child looks
at me and smiles like any other infant,"
and so they're trying to push against this establishment
saying, "these kids are nothing," but the parents are
going these kids are something.
Winnifred wanted Parker to go to school.
When she went to the school board and said I want to enroll
my son in the school, they immediately said,
"No, we can't teach this boy and we don't have these
children in our school, so you can't do this,
we will not let him come to school."
(light piano music)
- Back in the day people kind of thought that educating
children with developmental disabilities was kind of like
a leaky bucket; knowledge would go in and
pour right out the bottom.
It wasn't until Winnifred had Parker and she was able to see
that it's not a leaky bucket, I can teach Parker things and
he will learn them, it might take a little bit more time,
but there's different techniques and different strategies
that I can use to teach him.
- I knew that learning is memory, and Parker always seemed
to have a wonderful memory, and it was just a pleasure.
I used to work with him for four to five hours every day,
and I found out that he just progressed and
came along like a little house on fire.
- She was ridiculed, I'd have to say,
by a lot of people at the time, who felt that
these children were really not teachable.
- After Parker was 19 or 20, Winnifred Stewart was at
City Hall to meet someone, and she saw two parents rush out
crying and she asked the secretary, "What's going on?"
She said, "Oh they have a retarded child,
there's nothing we can do."
And Winnifred Stewart said, "There's something I can do."
And then they formed a group that all met together and
say we want to start a school for our children.
- And so little by little, through osmosis, she began to
get people coming to her with other challenged children
saying, "please please could you help my child and
could you help my child."
- She was bound and determined to get funding for her child
as well as other children with a developmental disability.
- In 1954, Winnifred Mary Stewart addressed the
Alberta Legislature and by the end of it,
it resulted in an amended bill to the Education Act.
- Alberta was the first province to have legislation that
gave money for children of Down syndrome,
or developmental delays, things like that.
So, she pushed to lead Alberta into the future.
So it's kind of interesting that it went from Alberta was
negative in the '30's and '40's, to actually going,
okay let's help these children.
- [Interviewer] Who is that?
Who's in this picture here? This one.
- Wayne.
- Wayne who?
- Wayne Gretzky.
- Wayne Gretzky's connection to the association
and to children with Down syndrome comes from Joey Moss.
When Wayne was first in Edmonton he dated Joey Moss' sister,
and they were friends, and he brought in Joey Moss
for the Edmonton Oilers.
- He's a celebrity who doesn't
know he's a celebrity.
- [Interviewer] What's your favourite part of your job,
what do you like most?
- Uh, just let me think.
I'm not sure ask Steve.
- Your favourite job- part of the job I think might be your
rest time, when you get to have a little break and a nap
between practice and the game day.
- [Inaudible 00:07:15]
- Cause you know why?
- Why?
- Cause you snore. (snoring)
Yeah see, yeah that's why. (laughing)
- [Interviewer] Do you snore?
- Yeah yeah, (snoring) yeah.
(laughing)
- I'm Madeleine Royer, and this is
my brother, Clarence Roberge.
As a family, we were far too protective of Clarence because
he was challenged, so he never would have learned or
accomplished what he's done had it not been
for The Winnifred Stewart.
They taught him things like being able to take the
Edmonton Transit System on his own, he was able to go
to work, he was able to do so many things that would never
have happened in our little protective circle.
- They didn't teach the children based on chronological age,
you're six you must learn this when you're six,
they taught them based on mental age.
Cause some kids may have been like 10,
but the mentality was like at five.
- I started here November 1st, 1976.
We had probably close to 400 students at that time;
three to four years of age up to young adults.
- Winnifred's school curriculum and her plans for the school,
spread across the country from Edmonton to Montreal,
Grande Prairie to Moscow, everywhere.
- Once children were integrated back into the school system,
1982, and the vote showed that the association should form
to serve adults with developmental disabilities, that's kind
of when things took off in a different direction.
- Okay, you want to take this?
- Right there, all the time.
- We offer services and supports
to over 200 individuals.
- We support them through day services,
day programs, residential services, we support them
throughout volunteer opportunities, work opportunities,
basically we support our clients in whatever they need.
We have individuals who have been in our service since they
were going to school at Winnifred Stewart's School.
We've grown up with them, we've celebrated their 18th
birthday with them, we've supported them when they go out to
work, we've supported these clients when they've been at
home with us, and now we're starting to see we
need to support them as they age.
One of the things that we're starting to see now is
people with developmental disabilities start to suffer from
Alzheimer's or other Dementias much much earlier than the
general population does.
- With his Alzheimer's now he has moved into one of their
facilities that has more 24 hour care,
and that's where we are today.
We feel really blessed that we have grown with Clarence
and it's part of life and as I say, we feel blessed.
(light music)
- I think the lesson of Winnifred's life and the
larger truth is, never give up.
- She knew her own child, and she knew what her child could
do and she just worked as hard as she can to help her child,
and in the end, help other children across the world.
- What's all of those?
- Half Oilers half Eskimos.
She brought together almost like a miracle for
the city for a place for these kids to go.
They get educated to have social development.
- I think for me, being a part of Winnifred Stewart,
one of the coolest things to be a part of is
the Winnifred Stewart Legacy.
To me that Legacy is not just what Winnifred did in 1953,
and it's not what we did in 1982, it's what we're doing now.
And that's supporting our clients and our individuals
in whatever way that might be.
- I think seeing the children progress that of course is the
main thing, that to me was the greatest thrill and of course
being able to get the facilities for them and anything
pertaining to them because they were first and foremost,
and anything else that's happened it evolved through them.
That to me was the greatest satisfaction of all to see a
child talk for the first time and really walk for
the first time and do that sort of thing.
That to me was the greatest.
(light music)
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