Countywide : Contest Opened New Vistas

Until she competed in the Miss Wheelchair America contest two years ago, Dawn Blodgett had doubted she would ever lead a normal life because of her cerebral palsy.

Then her outlook was changed by her fellow competitors.

“I was so amazed by the women I met because they were all so accomplished,” said Blodgett, 22, of Costa Mesa. “They had kids and master’s degrees and were all so successful.”

Since winning the title in 1993 in Denver, she has tried to promote that very image of the disabled--people who have jobs and go to school but do it on wheels.

Part of her campaign has been to bring the 25-year-old Miss Wheelchair America contest to California for the first time. It is held in a different location each year.

Today, her hard work will pay off as she heads to John Wayne Airport to greet contestants arriving from all over the United States for the pageant at the Anaheim Hilton and Towers.

“This title means something because all the judging is based on the accomplishments of the contestants,” she said.

Finding hotels and buses equipped to accommodate the 25 entrants, however, has at times been more difficult than she anticipated.

Before she contacted the Anaheim Hilton and Towers, Blodgett spoke to “a million hotels” in Orange County and found that few had special rooms for guests in wheelchairs.

But all of the Hilton’s meeting and banquet areas and 46 of its guest rooms are wheelchair accessible, a hotel spokesman said. The Hilton even has vans accessible to wheelchairs, which will be used Wednesday to shuttle the contestants to a day at Disneyland.

Unfortunately, those vans were not available to pick the contestants up at the airport, and Blodgett had problems finding affordable transportation from the airport to Anaheim.

“Airport shuttle companies charge $48 each way and [their vehicles] only hold one or two chairs,” Blodgett said. “So we are using my van to pick up a lot of the people.”

The pageant will last through the week. Activities include seminars on the Americans with Disabilities Act and a forum on public speaking, as well as the crowning event Saturday.

And though the pageant winner will don a rhinestone tiara, Blodgett wants nobody to make any mistake about Miss Wheelchair America being a beauty contest.

“This pageant is about breaking down barriers,” she said. It is also about opening doors, she said, because it gives the contestants an opportunity to speak their minds about what life is like in a wheelchair.