At first, Rick Hansen fought the idea of a wheelchair.
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Hansen → fight → wheelchair
But then it became a vehicle for his freedom
40 years ago, Hansen wheeled himself around the world, shattering stigma and raising $26M
At first, Rick Hansen saw his wheelchair as a symbol of limitations, eschewing what would eventually help propel him around the globe and shatter the true barriers: stigma and a world designed for the able-bodied.
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what → become → bodied
Instead, he often used crutches and leg braces to get around after he was paralyzed from the waist down at 15 when he was thrown from the back of a pickup truck in rural B.C.
“I had this stigma about it and I tried to avoid it with everything I possibly could,” he said of his wheelchair in a recent interview with The Current.
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he → use → Current
Eventually, he realized the issue was not his legs.
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issue → realize → ?
“It's coming from, usually, your mind and your heart and the precepts that you have,” he said.
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he → come → that
“You try to remove them and redefine them so that you're liberated and free … and you now see the wheelchair as your vehicle for mobility and freedom.”
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you → try → mobility
When he set out on the Man in Motion Tour on March 21, 1985, what he was most determined to do, he says, was to showcase the athleticism and power that still lived within his body and inside others with disabilities.
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that → set → disabilities
On May 22, 2027, 40 years will have passed since Hansen finished that tour, wheeling across 34 countries and 40,000 kilometres to raise $26 million.
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Hansen → pass → million
A film documenting that 26-month journey premiered at the Toronto Film Festival this week, Man in Motion: The Rick Hansen Story, with the final screening on Saturday.
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film → document → Saturday
Not only did his wheelchair take him around the world, Hansen has said his epiphany about it shifted his advocacy primarily to making spaces accessible, rather than on walking again, though the Rick Hansen Foundation has contributed heavily to spinal cord research.
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Foundation → take → research
That acceptance distinguishes Hansen from other high-profile people with spinal cord injuries, like Christopher Reeve; in a Globe and Mail interview in 2010, Hansen told the publication that the hope of walking unassisted one day is not the thing that drives him.
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that → distinguish → him
"My life is full," he said at the time.
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he → say → time
While many Canadians are familiar with Hansen’s legend, the film unearths the private moments from that time and how the physical and psychological toll caused the B.C.-born athlete to doubt himself.
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athlete → unearth → himself
The first moment of reckoning came as Hansen faced the brutal foothills of California’s Siskiyou Mountains.
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Hansen → come → Mountains
He already had tendonitis in wrists, and it was only Day 2.
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it → have → wrists
"I was like, literally, completely filled with fear, uncertainty, and I needed some big time support,” he said.
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he → fill → support
And I knew that if we could get up that one, maybe, maybe, maybe there was some hope.
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we → know → one
That support arrived in the form of his physiotherapist, Amanda Reid.
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support → arrive → physiotherapist
She had already helped him recover from a dislocated shoulder in April 1984 after he crashed going 80 km/h test-driving a new wheelchair he wanted to use on the tour.
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he → help → tour
Hansen said she quickly became the person he turned to for encouragement.
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he → say → encouragement
“With each passing mile, I grew more and more fond of her and eventually was in love with her,” he recalls.
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he → pass → her
They both acknowledge the tour tested their relationship.
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tour → acknowledge → relationship
But by the time the team returned to Canada in 1986, public support had picked up.
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support → return → 1986
This was before social media, Hansen reminds Current host Matt Galloway, so they were relying on "snail mail and carrier pigeons."
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they → remind → mail
That buoyed the couple and the team itself.
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That → buoy → couple
As they moved through New Brunswick, Hansen proposed and the pair would be married the next year.
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pair → move → Brunswick
They now have three daughters and five grandsons and have continued their advocacy work through the Rick Hansen Foundation, which funds spinal cord research and has also developed a accessibility certification for public and private buildings.
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which → have → buildings
And it was Amanda who talked him through one of the most challenging and remarkable moments on the journey: the Great Wall of China.
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who → talk → China
In his mind, Hansen says he had pictured wheeling up the Great Wall as a symbol of his journey — but they arrived to find 103 stairs he would have to navigate.
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he → say → stairs
He recalls not wanting to get out of the van and have his supporters see him being carried.
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him → recall → van
But Amanda said she "was quite blunt" and told him there were people with disabilities waiting for him, that his team had been “carrying [him] since the beginning” and that this was another example of their support.
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this → say → support
Hansen says he agrees that while he was the one in the wheelchair and the face of the campaign, his journey was that of a team.
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journey → say → team
For every moment where Hansen was able power through 13 hours of wheeling each day, in rain, up mountains and alongside angry drivers, there were others — like the Great Wall — that reminded him exactly why he was doing this.
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he → wheel → this
He would be invited to give a speech, and there would be steps to get onto the stage.
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He → invite → stage
In hotel rooms, he would have to crawl across the floor to get through spaces his wheelchair could not.
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wheelchair → have → spaces
And the ensuite washrooms were almost never accessible, he said.
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he → say → ?
“The world was built not for people with disabilities, it was built for an average person,” he said.
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he → build → person
“So this was the beginning of what I think is a global movement, you know, where hundreds of millions of people say, ‘That's not good enough.
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That → think → people
We're building a society for all of us.’”
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We → build → us
During his journey, Hansen had a touchstone that kept him going on the hardest days.
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that → have → days
…and 3 more, not listed.
The Aporia
