Karen Deming was recovering from a car accident when President George H. W. Bush passed the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990. Just married and 28 years old, Deming loved going to the beach in Pensacola, Florida, where she’d moved for college. But after the accident left her a quadriplegic, she found herself relying on her husband to carry her to the water. “It was so humiliating, I said I would never go back,” she says.
It took a few years, but she did go back—in a special wheelchair her husband Mike Deming designed for her using balloon-like tires that can easily roll on the sand. Today, various companies make beach wheelchairs of the sort, from the French-based Vipamat, to Wheeleez in the U.S. But in the 1990s, Karen found her options were pretty slim.
In 1996, the couple started a company named DeBug Mobility, designing, making, and selling beach wheelchairs. Today, the company sells them to cities, state and federal parks, and private clients like The Ritz, Hilton, Shangri-La, and cruise lines like Royal Caribbean, Disney, and Norwegian. “Accessibility has become not a niche market anymore, but actually a market that is viable all across different segments,” she says.
In many respects, America is a lot more accessible today than it was 30 years ago, largely due to the work of numerous grassroots movements and, of course, the ADA. Curb cuts are now ubiquitous. Buses and trains come with low floors and designated seating areas. And stairs are more often accompanied by ramps (unless you’re Steven Holl, and you’re building a library in Queens).
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