Two Deaf cyclists ride across USA, raise over $20k for deaf children
$25,000. 4,000 miles. 10 states. 2 Deaf cyclists. One goal. Catchy, right? Conrad Baer, who recently completed his MA at Boston University and Albert Blake, a teacher at Model Secondary School for the Deaf (MSSD) and a full time graduate student at Gallaudet University, are riding across the USA for a cause.
[Video clip of both starting their cycling journey]
Baer and Blake started their journey in Yorktown, Virginia. They will end in Astoria, Oregon.
Baer and Blake are raising support for the American Society for Deaf Children (ASDC). The funding will help ASDC’s resources for reaching out to more families with deaf children for opportunities to teach sign language.
Baer and Blake recently hit the 3,000 miles mark.
ALBERT BLAKE:
3,000
CONRAD BAER:
3,000
RENCA
The Daily Moth reached out to Baer and Blake for an interview. At the time of our interview, they were in Missoula, Montana.
They said that they wanted to experience riding across the USA, but also wanted to give back to our Deaf community by donating to ASDC. We asked them the reason of choosing to have all donations go to ASDC.
CONRAD BAER:
Okay, first of all, we had decided to bike across America over the summer of 2019. Then I had this thought. Why not do a fundraiser at the same time while we’re promoting our trip? We could really give back to the Deaf community this way. We could make it more than just checking off our bucket list of experiences. We came to an agreement then we talked about how we wanted to contribute in a way towards children, toward language access. This is something we can give back to our children because they are our future generations. We thought this was important then we talked about different ideas and organizations we could donate the money to. We decided on ASDC which focuses on families and deaf children. We’ve noticed that many deaf children don’t have language access at home. Perhaps because often when they’re born, the parents don’t know what to do though it’s not their fault. It could be that their views are just different. Their doctors might not have the right answers. There’s a huge gap that causes language deprivation among deaf children. We want to reduce that, but how? ASDC has resources that they can provide for hearing families with deaf children. With the funds raised, we can support these children and reduce that gap.
ALBERT BLAKE:
And also, I work with deaf children. I work at MSSD so I pretty much work with children and I’ve seen some of them who are delayed in terms of language because of different reasons including the parents’ decisions. You know, that has an effect on me. I’m doing this for our future deaf children. I agreed to it and thought we should definitely do it!
BAER:
Yes and actually…
BLAKE:
I am flexible…
BAER:
I’m a teacher too, so we feel that it’s our job. Our career has always been about supporting our deaf children.
RENCA:
The original goal was to raise $15,000, but they reached that goal really quickly, so they set a new goal which is now $25,000. Right now, they are almost at $23,000.
We asked what did they do to prepare for riding across USA.
BLAKE:
Yeah, we did train before doing this. Last summer, we did a 4-day trip starting in New York, in a small town called New Windsor which is near Albany, and biked to Boston, Massachusetts. We did it in 4 days for our training.
BAER:
240 miles, right?
BLAKE:
Yes, it was 240 miles. It helped us get a better idea of what was to come.
BAER:
Did I feel like I had sufficient, serious training before this trip? Not really, we did do the 240-mile trip then I got my new bike specifically for tour biking last April. I’ve ridden my bikes over a total of 200 miles over different days. My real training was after the first week of the trip. I was just thrown into the water with all this biking.
RENCA:
We asked them if they could share a significant experience from their journey.
BAER:
Something unbelievable happened to me in Montana.
BLAKE:
It was two days ago.
BAER:
Two, three days. Right. On that day, we had to bike 77 miles and we also had to climb over two different passes. During the first pass, I was going uphill. We were kind of biking a little bit slowly uphill.
BLAKE:
I was right behind him.
BAER:
We were on a road in the country, on a highway, where we were biking around a curve. It’s hard for the passerby drivers to see us. While we biked on by, what happened was this one gold pickup truck sped up right by us then pulled over and stopped in front of us. The door opened and it was a young woman in her 30s who jumped out of her truck, ran towards us and started yelling at me. She got up in front of me yelling and pointing at the road. I was still trying to bike uphill. When I got closer to her, I told her that I was deaf and that I couldn’t hear her. The woman just stopped talking. Then I told her to step aside because she was in my way. I was allowed to bike on this road because my map said so. While I was asking her to move, I could see she was getting a little more upset. Once I closed in on her, I just moved to the side myself then the woman decided to push me. She pushed me on the side. Luckily, I was a little prepared, so I absorbed the impact and didn’t fall over. I just moved over to the shoulder so I could stop. The woman proceeds to yell at him too.
BLAKE:
She got all up in front of me. She didn’t push me though, but she was saying something I couldn’t understand. The weird thing was she had 3 dogs in the back of her pickup truck. They were getting agitated too. The woman wanted us to move over so she could drive by. We refused to move so she just drove around us and sped up past us.
BAER:
The road was really narrow too, and we could barely stay on the shoulder. We tried to give her enough room so she could drive past us. I was so confused. We were definitely allowed to bike on the road. My map said it was allowed so I followed the directions. Some drivers just despise bikers. I just never thought that someone would get out of their cars and push me.
BLAKE:
Yeah, it was unbelievable.
RENCA:
We asked if there was anything that they wanted to say to our Deaf community.
BAER:
To our fans out there, biking across America has been a great experience. Our number one goal in fundraising is to hit $25,000. We’ve now earned $22,000 so far. That’s only less than $3,000 to go! I want to ask the community for their support. Remember, your donations do not go towards our travels. It goes directly to the deaf children. That can have an impact on many families where their Deaf children will have language access at home. That’s our goal: $25,000. Your support would be greatly appreciated.
BLAKE:
People have been sending us random messages of support for our mission, support for ASL and these kinds of messages. I just want to say that we appreciate it and to keep on sending these messages!
RENCA:
They started on June 8thand plan on reaching Astoria by August 11th. They are currently in Oregon. You can follow them on their Facebook page “Baer and Blake Across America.” You can also help them reach their $25,000 goal by making a donation. Link is in the transcript.
We, the Daily Moth, wish you the best of luck with the last leg of your trip!
Captioned by www.aslcaptions.com
https://www.facebook.com/BBikeUSA