A Tribute to Walt Stromer

World War II blinded veteran Dr. Walter Stromer, Mt. Vernon, Iowa, periodically delighted the BVA Bulletin readership for more than 50 years. An accomplished and prolific writer and speaker on a variety of social and political themes, his short Bulletin pieces often illustrated the futility of mainstream society’s attempts at dealing with blindness and low vision.

Walt was a professor of speech at Cornell College in Mt. Vernon for 30 years and a recipient of the BVA Achievement Award (now the Maas Award) in 1960. Walt passed away on May 12, 2005 at the age of 85. Although space limitations often precluded publication of his many submissions, the following is a tribute to his contributions to BVA. Walt originally sent this piece to the Bulletin in September of 2003.

A “Touching” Tale

Ma Bell used to have a slogan, “Reach out and touch someone.” But even Ma Bell lost “touch” with the world and did not warn you that some items in our society are untouchable.

Blinded veteran Walt Stromer, left, professional scholar and master communicator, is remembered for his wit and commentary on a variety of subjects relating to blindness. Walt reminisced with then BVA National President Neil Appleby during a September 2003 visit to Walt's hometown of Mt. Vernon, Iowa.

I’m not just referring to criminals. For example, you should not regularly touch your computer screen, nor the surface of compact disks, nor the pastries in the bakery for which you do not intend to pay. And, if you go to a botanical garden and insist on feeling the orchids, you may be asked to leave. Even in museums, you are often forbidden to touch the displays unless they have issued plastic gloves to you. Boys older than I am have told me that if you go to certain nightclubs, you are not permitted to touch the merchandise, even if you put a handkerchief over your fingers.

I was reminded of all this again recently when I went to the local care center to visit my wife. They were having a picnic on the patio and they had invited 8-10 owners of antique cars to show to the residents. I asked one of the aides to take me over to the car area, where there was some discussion about residents and visitors not touching the cars. The fingerprints would remove the immaculate shine, they said.

I asked one of the owners, “Do they have any Model T Fords here? I’d like to check one out because that is what my family owned until I was 16.” I told him that I knew that the cars were all spotlessly polished and that I was aware that they would not be pleased to have people leaving their grimy fingerprints on them. I also explained that, being totally blind, touching was the only way I could “see” the cars.

“If I put a handkerchief over my fingers, would that work”? I asked rather cryptically.

He said without even a pause that he wouldn’t mind me doing that if the car were his, but that he didn’t own that particular Ford and that maybe I’d better not. He did suggest that I might inspect the yellow Ford truck. The aide took me over to the truck, at which point I whipped out my handkerchief and inspected the car. I gushed over how kind he was to allow me to actually touch his vehicle with my handkerchief. I was surprised at how much I had forgotten about the shapes of cars. As I was inspecting, the man said, “You’re actually doing a nice job of polishing my truck,” and there was a pleasing tone to his voice.