A DREAM Turned into Reality
A DREAM volunteer instructor partners with an athlete on an adaptive paddleboard on Whitefish Lake.
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Celebrating 35 Years of promoting inclusion and providing empowering experiences in the great outdoors. By Julie Tickle, Executive Director DREAM Adaptive Recreation
It was quite the coincidence to learn that the founder of DREAM Adaptive Recreation in Whitefish, Montana currently lives 40 minutes from my hometown in western New York. As the new Executive Director, I couldn’t wait to give her a giant hug and hear the important details of our organization’s history directly from the source. It’s not often you get to sit down with a real-life trailblazer.
When Dottie Maitland started her Flathead Valley travel company, Tours by Maitland in 1981, she wasn’t aware of the profound impact she’d have on our community and beyond. However, not long after opening, she received a phone call that would etch a life changing new mission into her heart.
Dottie was contacted by a family looking to visit the area who had a member with cerebral palsy. She recalls their excitement when she confirmed their trip, as they had been turned away by all other tour companies due to the challenge of supporting someone with a disability. They had started to think that their dream was not a possibility. Dottie conducted some research and put together an itin-
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erary for the family that included visits to Flathead Lake and Glacier National Park. Although the family was thrilled, Dottie recalls being shocked at how few places were accessible to people with mobility challenges.
Immediately after the family’s tour Dottie invited friends Jane Lopp and Larry Dominick to form a fact-finding group to spearhead advocacy efforts in the local area focused on accessibility. Dottie then traveled to Washington, D.C. to meet with the Congressional Compliance Board and returned armed with new ideas and information. It wasn’t long before they realized additional support was needed if they were to gain any traction. You see, this was all taking place five years before the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed into law. The team grew when Larry McMillian, Dennis Jones and Jim Oliverson joined the crew. Important relationships were built with the Forest Service, Glacier National Park, the Bureau of Land Management, and City Parks and Recreation Departments. In 1985 they formally founded Disabled Recreation Environmental Access Movement, what we now know as DREAM Adaptive Recreation. The group’s main mission back then was to educate the community about accessibility issues.
The DREAM team didn’t waste any time. Some of their first projects included: Working with Glacier National Park and the Forest Service on paving the Trail of the Cedars, making campgrounds, fishing access and bathrooms around the Flathead Valley accessible, and adding paved pathways and improving the pool area and restrooms at Kalispell’s Woodland Park.
Dottie Maitland, Founder (right) and Julie Tickle, Executive Director (left) connect in western New York; “I am so proud of what my dream became. Thanks to many, it continues to grow.” - Dottie Maitland