Blast from the Past..Marlee Speaks in 1990!

In his latest vlog for Purple, Kelby Brick mentions that Marlee Matlin testified on Captiol Hill in 1990. Caption Action 2 searched for and found Marlee's words from her 1990 testimony for the Television Decoder Circuitry Act of 1990. Her words were found in this file.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF CLOSED CAPTIONING

Until the 1970s, deaf and hard-of-hearing persons had no access to television. Marlee Matlin, who is deaf and who testified at the hearing on this bill, described her experience: As a little girl growing up in Chicago, I had dreams just like any other child . . . to be a policeman, a dancer, a teacher, an actress. I was always told: follow your dreams and be what you want to be. No dream was beyond my reach. But in many of my dreams, I just sat by and watched without understanding a single word of what was being said. As a child, only through my mother could I understand the antics of "The Electric Company"; only through my dad could I understand what Mannix said to his Girl Friday; and only through my brothers could I understand the laughter on "All in the Family." There was no such thing as captioned television, and those moments of dreaming were not open to me. (Matlin Statement; June 20, 1990; p. 1.)