Access Living mourns the passing of our dear friend and Chicagoan Mike Ervin this morning after a brief illness.
Mike was a giant in the disability movement, both locally and nationally, and the beloved husband of our former longtime Access Living colleague, Rahnee Patrick. Mike’s deeply irreverent humor, brains, generosity, and fighting spirit embodied the best of disability rights activism. He made all of us braver and more loved. Generations of activists with disabilities learned that if Mike Ervin could “stick it to the man,” they could too.
Born on an army base in West Germany in 1956, Mike grew up in Chicago with muscular dystrophy. He spent several years at what was then known as the Illinois Children’s Hospital-School, which he referred to sarcastically as the Sam Houston Institute of Technology (SHIT). Living in a children’s institution fueled Mike’s lifelong drive to fight for disability accessibility and community living.
Like so many young people in the 1970s, Mike was a man of the radical times and became involved in the emerging local disability movement. As the movement gathered momentum in the 1980s, Mike co-founded Chicago ADAPT and led countless actions to fight for accessible public transportation, winning the right to accessible buses before the passage of the federal Americans with Disabilities Act. In 1987, he married his first wife, Anna Stonum, a fellow Chicago ADAPT founder. With his sister, Cris Matthews, Mike fought the Jerry Lewis Muscular Dystrophy Telethon by founding the activist group, Jerry’s Orphans. In 2005, Jerry’s Orphans created the documentary The Kids are All Right. Along the way, he was joined by countless members of the Access Living community, who looked to him as a fellow leader and friend.
Many disability advocates got to know Mike through his writing, especially as a humorist. He contributed to early disability movement publications like Mouth Magazine. He wrote a regular column for The Progressive (most recently here) and was published in a wide variety of news outlets over the years. Mike’s plays included “The Plucky and Spunky Show” and “The History of Bowling.” For many years, he worked with the Victory Gardens Theater and ran playwriting workshops. Most recently, he maintained the Smart Ass Cripple blog. His papers through 2009 are held at Chicago’s Newberry Library.
For many younger disabled people, Mike was a beloved “old fart” mentor. They could count on him to listen thoughtfully and help keep work on track. Mike continued to be a critical voice in Chicago ADAPT, keeping the group focused, democratic, and sassy. Above all, Mike was a constant voice in Chicago ADAPT’s struggle to fight against cuts to state-funded home and community-based services. He was single-minded and tenacious, because he knew that community supports and access were, in fact, a life-or-death matter.
After his first wife Anna passed away in 1999, Mike married Rahnee Patrick in 2006. He continued to pursue his passions for writing, raising hell, beer, traveling, and elaborate April Fool’s jokes. Every year on New Year’s Eve, his door was open to disability community friends to celebrate the arrival of a new year. For decades, he also ran what he called his “pit crew”: a succession of personal attendants who, under Mike’s supervision, helped him with home services and with a very active life in the community.
Today and in the days to come, our hearts are with Rahnee and Mike’s family, the many pit crew folks, Mike’s activist comrades, fellow artists, and all who were lucky to be counted among Mike’s friends and admirers. Mike Ervin, ¡presente!