Larry Ruiz, GJ ‘State Home, and the Americans with Disability Act

In 1954, when Larry Ruiz was born, diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy, and abandoned by his mother at the Grand Junction ‘State Home,’ an institute for the physically and mentally disabled, no one expected him to do anything but stay hidden from society. But Larry, while confined to a wheelchair and with sever speech impediments, he always maintained that his brain was “completely intact.”

A November 27th 1966 Daily Sentinel has a picture of 12 year old Larry riding a modified tricycle. Larry Ruiz spent his infancy, childhood and teenage years confined to the state hospital here in Grand Junction, where he had to teach himself how to read.

But Larry was not destined to remain hidden for long. In 1972, at the age of 18, Larry was transferred to the notorious Heritage House in Lakewood, CO. Three years later he and other residents escaped with the help of Presbyterian minister and civil rights activist Wade Blank. They set up their own community, The Atlantis Community.

Three years later in 1978, Larry, Wade and 17 other people of varying degrees of ability, blocked a RTD bus in Denver, for two days, demanding handicap accessibility on all RTD buses. “No Taxation without Transportation” read one sign.

The activist group ADAPT was born, and Larry was a founding member. ADAPT was a major part of a national movement for disabled rights that finally culminated the Capital Crawl protest, and ultimately in the passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act, in 1990.

The draw- out fight lasted for years, and Larry was always on the frontline. Larry is pictured in The Rocky Mountain News, 1985 article, blocking yet another bus. According to his obituary, published May 1st, 2012, in the Denver Post, Larry Ruiz racked up over 60 arrests for acts of civil disobedience.

His longtime friend and fellow activist, Julie Farrar had this to say about his activism “he put all his energy into change, into achieving a higher social justice for everyone. It was amazing someone with his past, all those years in an institution, could use that for good”