Finding collections relating to d/Deaf, disabled and neurodiverse people

One of the aims of our project is to make collections relating to d/Deaf, disabled and neurodivergent people more visible – and to share some of the objects our Fellows and Trainees are discovering.

Some will have quite obvious connections to disabled people’s lives – a walking stick, some braille or images of disabled people. But we will also be exploring less obvious connections too. Sometimes the significance of an object is its owner; its part in a bigger story, or the way someone with lived experience of disability has responded to it. In this way we hope to broaden the ways that d/Deaf, disabled and neurodivergent stories are told.

Collections

BUFFER BOYS BE WARNED! (Poster)

Current search< Previous recordNext record >

Rights information: Copyright: Museum of Liverpool

Description

This poster reads: ‘Buffer Boys- Be Warned! Only duffers ride on buffers! Don’t do this for sport and be crippled for sport- for life!’ There is an illustration of a tram, with a young boy climbing on the back, and another young boy falling off the tram and on to the track.

Liverpool Corporation Passenger Transport produced a series of around 50 of these information posters for travellers 1957-58. They primarily promoted safety messages and events. This poster warns children of the dangers of jumping and hitching a ride on the buffers of trams.

The language, deliberately aimed at boys, warns of the dire consequences of ‘becoming crippled.’ At this time, an acquired disability was viewed and treated by wider society as life-ending, rather than life-changing.

- Iris Sirendi, Curating for Change Fellow, Museum of Liverpool

Meet our Fellows and Trainees

The Curating for Change project is running eight Fellowships over 18 months and eight Traineeships over 40 days based across 20 partner museums. Learn more about our Fellows and Trainees here.

Find out more