WHY USE THE LONG WHITE CANE?
                                  by Allan Nichols

     From the Associate Editor: Allan Nichols is one of the leaders of the National
Federation of the Blind of Wyoming. He recently graduated from the Colorado Center
for the Blind, one of the NFB adult rehabilitation centers, where he mastered Braille
and the use of the long white cane. He is now a forceful and dedicated proponent of
both skills. (See the February, 1991 issue of the Braille Monitor for his article on
using Braille as a diabetic.) Recently he has been thinking about cane travel and the
importance of coming to terms with the long white cane, and he has made me stop and
think about the same subject. 
     The first cane I was trained to use was made of aluminum and came to my
diaphram. It had a crook at the top; its tip got caught in every crack in the
sidewalk; and I hated it. 
     The summer before I left for college, my state agency counselor suggested that I
switch to a folding cane so that I wouldn't be so conspicuous. He explained (with
faulty logic that even I should have spotted at the time) that a folding cane didn't
need to be as long as a straight cane. So I armed myself with a waist-length cane
that would fall apart whenever the elastic wore through--generally in the most
inconvenient and embarrassing places--and entered college.
     Not until I joined the Federation did my cane, like my mind and my spirit, begin
to grow. Almost my first act in the exhibit hall at my first national convention was
to purchase a fifty-seven-inch straight cane. It was longer than any cane I had ever
seen, let alone used, and it took me a few weeks to get used to handling the greater
length. But through the years my canes have grown to sixty-three inches. They come to
my nose when I am wearing high heels, and I keep several on hand to use with
different color combinations and in different situations. 
     I often observe cane-users around me and wonder why so many continue to cling to
canes that are obviously and painfully too short for them. Mr. Nichols has asked
himself this same question, and his analysis appears in the article that follows. But
I think that there are at least two additional factors to consider: 
     Despite all our talk about the many ways in which Federationists help one
another to improve their cane technique, many of us don't find ourselves in
situations in which we can ask really competent cane travelers to show us what good
cane technique looks and feels like. People who do not travel independently with
confidence usually go to chapter meetings and state and national conventions with
others who are willing to give them a hand. So they don't find themselves alone with
good travelers where they can talk and work without inconveniencing a sighted guide.
Cane travel seminars at state conventions, in which people are encouraged to move
around the hotel using longer canes and improved technique, can be very helpful to
many members. Good travelers should make a point of offering to work with interested
people whenever there is an opportunity. This must be done tactfully, however. It is
easy for a short-cane user to be made uncomfortable by implied or direct criticism.
The truth is that the quality of one's travel skills, not the quality of one's mind
or spirit, is reflected in the length of one's cane and the dexterity with which one
uses it. 
     The other issue that we confront very infrequently is the question of how to
manage the increased length of a cane. Personally I think it is better to get used to
a longer cane gradually. I don't mean using a long cane occasionally and a short cane
the rest of the time.  Rather, I recommend that people who do not have the luxury of
working with a good cane travel teacher regularly begin with a cane that is two to
four inches longer than the one they are used to traveling with. The increase in the
amount of information obtained will be immediate and noticeable, and one can learn to
manage the slightly greater length more easily than one can an increase of ten inches
or a foot. As one's skill and confidence increase, one will instinctively replace
each cane with a longer one until the right cane length is achieved. Many cane travel
teachers suggest that the cane should come up to the chin. Faster walkers will want
somewhat longer canes. 
     I have heard three complaints leveled at the long cane: it is hard to stow
safely in a car; it is hard to keep out of other people's way when it is not in use;
and it is hard to use safely and courteously in a crowd. All of these complaints have
some validity, but all are solvable. 
     There are some cars manufactured in the developing world that really are too
small for a long straight cane. I rode in several of them last year in the
Philippines. In such situations there is no alternative but to use a telescoping cane
and collapse it before entering the car. But most cars driven in America, even if
they are small, are large enough to admit a long straight cane. The problems
evaporate if one remembers to bring the handle in first if one is entering the front
seat and the tip in first if one is assigned the back seat. When the handle comes
first, push it back over the shoulder nearest the door, and guide the tip in with
your hand until it is resting on the floor beside your feet. In this way it will not
be crushed when the door is closed. If the back seat of a four-door car is your
destination, get in and slide the tip along the side of the front seat until enough
of the shaft is lying between the front seat and the front door to allow you to pull
the handle through the back door. Hold the cane close to your body and close the
door. Getting into the back seat of a two-door car will require a certain amount of
trial and error since the size of the door will determine the best way to bring the
cane in. But if you have mastered front and back seat entry in a four-door car, you
will find yourself in control of the two-door situation. 
     The biggest trick to conscientious management of a cane at rest is to remember
it. Take note of any nearby walls or corners against which the cane can be propped or
slid. If not, can it lie safely along a row of chairs? I keep my foot on my cane to
insure that it does not decide to migrate while I am doing something else. One should
always know where both ends of the cane are and should keep them out of patterns of
traffic. If you can't tell whether the cane is stowed safely, ask someone else if it
is out of the way. 
     Traveling safely and considerately has its own tricks and rules. In the wide
open spaces of an empty sidewalk, the cane tip can arc freely, making a small angle
with the ground. The problem is that a cane held in this position can be dangerous to
people in front of the blind traveler if the tip accidentally gets between their legs
or under one foot. The more densely crowded an area is, the more nearly vertical the
cane should be held. The larger angle formed by the cane and the ground decreases the
distance one can sweep, but in a crowd one does not need as much stopping time or
distance since one's speed is necessarily slowed. The pencil grip is the best way to
hold a cane in a crowd since one has maximum control in this position, and the hand
can slide quickly and easily down the shaft of the cane in order to shorten the
length being used. As soon as the path opens again, with a flip of the fingers the
cane will slide back out to its full length. 
     There is ample reason for each of us to practice and master these skills. We
have all seen people use canes rudely, and one can hardly blame others for wanting to
avoid behavior that can anger or injure other people. But the long white cane is a
wonderful tool, and everyone who uses a cane at all should be encouraged to try it.
Here is Allan Nichols' article about his experience:

     Last week I received a telephone call from our chapter president. He told me
about a bad accident that had happened to a blind woman who lives across from him in
his apartment building. She took a bad fall in an antique store. It is not my
intention to embarrass her in this article. However, I do want to point out the way
in which this unfortunate accident could have been prevented by the proper use of a
long white cane.
     I telephoned her in the hospital the day after it happened because I was
concerned about her. She told me that she had been in a local antique store, where
she asked an employee for directions to a particular item. She said that this
employee had given her confusing instructions. Before she knew what had happened, she
had walked into a stairwell and had fallen, unable to stop herself. Her injuries
included a broken right wrist, two broken fingers on her left hand, and multiple
bruises on her neck, head, back, and legs. As bad as things are, she was fortunate
that her fall did not paralyze or kill her. A woman in her seventies and almost
totally blind, she uses a short support cane when she goes out by herself.
     On the surface this is just an unfortunate accident caused by miscommunication
between a blind woman and a store employee. However, a closer look at this woman's
background sheds light on the possible reason that this accident occurred.
     She uses a short white support cane for the limited independent travel she does.
According to her friend in the apartment building, her cane is just long enough to
check a few inches in front of her. She uses it because it gives her support when she
walks. When asked why she does not use a longer one, she has told him, "I know a
person who was in an accident because he used one of those long canes." I know that
she has not had proper training in the use of the long white cane. In talking with
her just the other day, I learned that in the three times she has attended the blind
camp offered here in Wyoming, no one ever gave her training in mobility and the use
of the long white cane. She has picked up the limited knowledge she has of how to use
her short cane on her own.
     In the National Federation of the Blind we have the opportunity to share good
ideas and travel techniques with each other. When one of us encounters a problem or
learns a lesson the hard way, we share the knowledge in an effort to prevent the same
thing from happening to someone else. That is one of the reasons why we have the NFB
training centers located in Colorado, Louisiana, and Minnesota. I am sure that there
are other training programs across the country also effectively teaching good
techniques to blind people. The Federation's fifty-one years of progress in sharing
information and the good rehabilitation teaching that exists in several locations
suggest that we have already worked out many of the problems with travel techniques.
The task now is getting this information to the people who really need it.
     What am I suggesting? Could this woman have avoided this bad accident? I believe
so. First of all, if she had been using a long white cane, she would have had
adequate warning before she came to the steps on which she fell. A properly sized
cane should sweep two to three steps in front of the user who is walking at a normal
pace. I received a good portion of my mobility training at the Colorado Center for
the Blind (CCB). The travel instructors encouraged each of us to use a cane that came
up to between the chin and the tip of the nose when held vertically.
     When I first arrived at the CCB in Denver, I was using a short (forty-eight-
inch) straight cane and a folding cane, about fifty-two inches long. Neither of
these, however, was satisfactory for me to use in walking confidently. The short
straight cane did not allow me to walk upright. It also did not give me adequate
warning of obstacles in front of me. My folding cane, while a bit longer, was too
heavy to allow me to get a good rhythm when I walked. Its length proved inadequate.
     On my first day of mobility training, my travel instructor gave me a fifty-
seven-inch cane to use. My first reaction to it was that it seemed to be too long for
me. However, the more I used it, the more I began to rely on its additional length to
warn me of hazards in my path. After a few months of using this length cane, the size
did not seem so unwieldy any more. Before I finished training at the Colorado Center,
I changed to a sixty-one-inch cane with which I now feel more comfortable. Being
about five feet, ten inches tall, I can walk confidently using this length with a
good measure of safety. I have also found that, if I project an image of confidence
when I walk, people treat me with more respect. If I look lost or bent over, groping
with a cane that is too short, strangers I meet often react to me as if I were
disoriented and unsure of myself. This view of blind people perpetuates the myth of
helplessness that has for too long kept us from achieving first-class status.
     Since I have been traveling independently, I have had many instances in which
the extra length has saved my bacon. While walking on campus at the University of
Wyoming in Laramie, I normally keep a fairly quick pace, especially in familiar
areas. I can remember two instances in which I could have had disastrous falls. One
day I was walking down a hallway briskly, not paying much attention to where I was
going. I was a bit farther to one side of the hall than I normally walked. Suddenly,
I felt the end of my cane drop. I had located a stairwell that I did not even know
existed. I simply stopped, adjusted my path, and continued to my destination. With
this simple warning I avoided bodily injury by only a step or two. A second incident
happened in a different building. Again I was traveling quickly to get to an
appointment. I assumed that the hallway was clear as I walked down it. Unknown to me,
someone had placed a cart with audiovisual equipment in my path, just outside a
classroom doorway. I hit the equipment cart with my cane in full stride, but because
I had the proper length of cane, I had adequate time to react, and I was able to stop
before I cracked into it.
     Certainly there is no way for blind people to avoid all accidents, just as there
is no way for sighted people to do so. About eleven years ago, when I became the
manager of a Randolph-Sheppard cafeteria in Cheyenne, I had an experience that
graphically illustrates this point. The day that I received the door keys to my
coffee shop for the first time, I felt quite proud of myself as I left for the
evening. I walked out of my coffee shop located in the basement of the GSA Post
Office complex in downtown Cheyenne and prepared to mount the stairs, ready to go
home. I was not paying much attention to what I was doing and definitely not covering
the area in front of my feet with my cane. I subsequently plowed my head into the
wall next to the stairwell. Seeing stars for the first time in years, I felt the
blood trickling down my face. Fortunately, a building maintenance man saw my problem
and helped me. In this instance I do not know if my problem was my lack of attention
to what I was doing, my short cane, or my lack of skill in using it. Perhaps it was a
combination of all three. I do know that I have avoided similar disasters since then
by having the proper size cane and acquiring the training to use it correctly.
     It seems to me that fear of the unknown is our greatest enemy. Many newly
blinded individuals, and some not so newly blinded ones, fear going places by
themselves. Either they do not go out at all, or they wait until a sighted family
member or friend can accompany them. I believe that it is their fear of being
involved in an accident that keeps some blind people confined to their own homes. The
use of a long white cane and the knowledge to use one can ameliorate this fear. After
sufficient training and getting experience using the cane, a blind person can safely
and confidently travel virtually anywhere. The valuable training I received at the
Colorado Center for the Blind has proven this to me. I have traveled through the
streets of downtown Denver independently with no fear of imperiling myself. I have
used Denver's regional bus system to travel from my apartment in the suburb of
Littleton to Denver, then to Boulder to walk around the campus of the University of
Colorado, before returning home. All of this travel was done using my own wits and my
long white cane.
     Others may prefer using a guide dog. But whether we use a dog or a cane, we need
to be in charge of where we go and what we do.
     The cane and the dog are just tools. They can be used properly or misused. For
instance, no one would dare imply that we ought to outlaw the use of hammers for
constructing buildings. Some people have accidentally hit themselves with a hammer,
but this is no reason to get rid of hammers. They are simply tools, and people need
to know how to use them properly. The same can be said for the long white cane. It is
not simply a device telling others that we are blind and that they either ought to
stay out of our way or ought to rush sympathetically to preserve such helpless
creatures. The long white cane must be recognized as a device that blind people use
as a tool of independence.
     I am not ashamed to be seen with my long white cane. I think of it in the way
others might regard their eyeglasses. When I travel on an airliner, I view anyone who
wants to take my cane away the same way as another person might a flight attendant
who tried to confiscate his eyeglasses. Until we blind people feel comfortable and
unashamed walking with our canes, we will not achieve the first-class status we so
rightly want. Until the sighted world views our canes as normal and a part of our
independence, we will continue to have an image problem. With adequate education of
blind people in using the long white cane, we can overcome the fear of traveling
anywhere we wish. When others see us participating in our communities, not fearing
our blindness, we will make headway in overcoming the negative stereotypes that have
traditionally plagued us. Let us grab our long white canes and confidently and
fearlessly stride out to join the rest of the world.