If Willie Levi had enjoyed choice in life, he would have gone back to Texas — back to the small city of Orange, where he had played the spoons, sung the blues and lived in a shotgun house crowded with cousins.
But Mr. Levi never had much choice. He was sent first to an institution and then to Iowa, where he and other men with intellectual disabilities worked in virtual servitude at a turkey-processing plant for decades. He never made it back to Orange.
Mr. Levi — a claimant in a successful lawsuit by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that championed proper pay and working conditions for people with disabilities — died on April 23 at his home in Waterloo, Iowa, after contracting the novel coronavirus, according to Paula Passe, one of his court-appointed guardians. He was 73.
Mr. Levi was born in Orange on Aug. 19, 1946, to Ernest and Rosalie Levi. His father was a mill worker, his mother a hotel housekeeper. He lived with cousins until he was 19, when he was taken to a Texas state school in Mexia, more than 200 miles away.
He won gold medals at statewide track meets for special schools, sang with a traveling gospel choir and knew how to summon music with a comb or a couple of spoons.
In 1974, Mr. Levi was sent to work for Henry’s Turkey Service, which then dispatched him and other men with disabilities 1,000 miles north to Muscatine County, Iowa, where the company had a contract with a turkey-processing plant.
Mr. Levi specialized in soothing the creatures that he sent swinging on shackles toward the kill room. “I pat ’em on the belly when I get ’em on the shackle,” he once recalled. “I say, ‘OK, OK, Tom, quieten down.’”
As recounted in The New York Times and in an online Times documentary, the men were paid the same $65 a month for decades, in a perversion of a labor law that allowed people with disabilities to be paid less than what a nondisabled person was paid for the same job. Never given options about employment or housing, the men were forced to live in an old school converted into a bunkhouse.
In 2009, after years of inaction, government agencies evacuated the bunkhouse, which had devolved into a fetid firetrap of neglect. Mr. Levi had a broken kneecap, among other health problems, including a depression so deep that he sometimes screamed at night.
In 2013, the E.E.O.C won its federal lawsuit against Henry’s Turkey Service. By then the Muscatine County officials serving as his guardians had arranged for Mr. Levi to live with three bunkhouse brothers in a supervised setting in Waterloo.
In retirement, Mr. Levi became active in a local church, took vacations and enjoyed dine-and-dance dates with his girlfriend. He often wore Mardi Gras beads and kept spoons tucked in a sock, in case of a sudden need for music.
Mr. Levi talked often of returning to Orange, but his family members had either died or could not be found. After his death, though, Mr. Canino and The Times located a few relatives.
“They took him away so long ago,” Claudette Owens, a distant cousin, said. “Nobody even knew that he existed.”
But Laura Owens, a first cousin in a nursing home near Orange, remembered Mr. Levi living with her family in that shotgun house.
“Playing the comb,” she said. “And singing a lot.”
Mr. Levi was to be buried in the same historic African-American cemetery that holds the remains of his mother. Back home in Orange.
But Mr. Levi never had much choice. He was sent first to an institution and then to Iowa, where he and other men with intellectual disabilities worked in virtual servitude at a turkey-processing plant for decades. He never made it back to Orange.
Mr. Levi — a claimant in a successful lawsuit by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that championed proper pay and working conditions for people with disabilities — died on April 23 at his home in Waterloo, Iowa, after contracting the novel coronavirus, according to Paula Passe, one of his court-appointed guardians. He was 73.
Mr. Levi was born in Orange on Aug. 19, 1946, to Ernest and Rosalie Levi. His father was a mill worker, his mother a hotel housekeeper. He lived with cousins until he was 19, when he was taken to a Texas state school in Mexia, more than 200 miles away.
He won gold medals at statewide track meets for special schools, sang with a traveling gospel choir and knew how to summon music with a comb or a couple of spoons.
In 1974, Mr. Levi was sent to work for Henry’s Turkey Service, which then dispatched him and other men with disabilities 1,000 miles north to Muscatine County, Iowa, where the company had a contract with a turkey-processing plant.
Mr. Levi specialized in soothing the creatures that he sent swinging on shackles toward the kill room. “I pat ’em on the belly when I get ’em on the shackle,” he once recalled. “I say, ‘OK, OK, Tom, quieten down.’”
As recounted in The New York Times and in an online Times documentary, the men were paid the same $65 a month for decades, in a perversion of a labor law that allowed people with disabilities to be paid less than what a nondisabled person was paid for the same job. Never given options about employment or housing, the men were forced to live in an old school converted into a bunkhouse.
In 2009, after years of inaction, government agencies evacuated the bunkhouse, which had devolved into a fetid firetrap of neglect. Mr. Levi had a broken kneecap, among other health problems, including a depression so deep that he sometimes screamed at night.
In 2013, the E.E.O.C won its federal lawsuit against Henry’s Turkey Service. By then the Muscatine County officials serving as his guardians had arranged for Mr. Levi to live with three bunkhouse brothers in a supervised setting in Waterloo.
In retirement, Mr. Levi became active in a local church, took vacations and enjoyed dine-and-dance dates with his girlfriend. He often wore Mardi Gras beads and kept spoons tucked in a sock, in case of a sudden need for music.
Mr. Levi talked often of returning to Orange, but his family members had either died or could not be found. After his death, though, Mr. Canino and The Times located a few relatives.
“They took him away so long ago,” Claudette Owens, a distant cousin, said. “Nobody even knew that he existed.”
But Laura Owens, a first cousin in a nursing home near Orange, remembered Mr. Levi living with her family in that shotgun house.
“Playing the comb,” she said. “And singing a lot.”
Mr. Levi was to be buried in the same historic African-American cemetery that holds the remains of his mother. Back home in Orange.
If Willie Levi had enjoyed choice in life, he would have gone back to Texas — back to the small city of Orange, where he had played the spoons, sung the blues and lived in a shotgun house crowded with cousins.
But Mr. Levi never had much choice. He was sent first to an institution and then to Iowa, where he and other men with intellectual disabilities worked in virtual servitude at a turkey-processing plant for decades. He never made it back to Orange.
Mr. Levi — a claimant in a successful lawsuit by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that championed proper pay and working conditions for people with disabilities — died on April 23 at his home in Waterloo, Iowa, after contracting the novel coronavirus, according to Paula Passe, one of his court-appointed guardians. He was 73.
Mr. Levi was born in Orange on Aug. 19, 1946, to Ernest and Rosalie Levi. His father was a mill worker, his mother a hotel housekeeper. He lived with cousins until he was 19, when he was taken to a Texas state school in Mexia, more than 200 miles away.
He won gold medals at statewide track meets for special schools, sang with a traveling gospel choir and knew how to summon music with a comb or a couple of spoons.
In 1974, Mr. Levi was sent to work for Henry’s Turkey Service, which then dispatched him and other men with disabilities 1,000 miles north to Muscatine County, Iowa, where the company had a contract with a turkey-processing plant.
Mr. Levi specialized in soothing the creatures that he sent swinging on shackles toward the kill room. “I pat ’em on the belly when I get ’em on the shackle,” he once recalled. “I say, ‘OK, OK, Tom, quieten down.’”
As recounted in The New York Times and in an online Times documentary, the men were paid the same $65 a month for decades, in a perversion of a labor law that allowed people with disabilities to be paid less than what a nondisabled person was paid for the same job. Never given options about employment or housing, the men were forced to live in an old school converted into a bunkhouse.
In 2009, after years of inaction, government agencies evacuated the bunkhouse, which had devolved into a fetid firetrap of neglect. Mr. Levi had a broken kneecap, among other health problems, including a depression so deep that he sometimes screamed at night.
In 2013, the E.E.O.C won its federal lawsuit against Henry’s Turkey Service. By then the Muscatine County officials serving as his guardians had arranged for Mr. Levi to live with three bunkhouse brothers in a supervised setting in Waterloo.
In retirement, Mr. Levi became active in a local church, took vacations and enjoyed dine-and-dance dates with his girlfriend. He often wore Mardi Gras beads and kept spoons tucked in a sock, in case of a sudden need for music.
Mr. Levi talked often of returning to Orange, but his family members had either died or could not be found. After his death, though, Mr. Canino and The Times located a few relatives.
“They took him away so long ago,” Claudette Owens, a distant cousin, said. “Nobody even knew that he existed.”
But Laura Owens, a first cousin in a nursing home near Orange, remembered Mr. Levi living with her family in that shotgun house.
“Playing the comb,” she said. “And singing a lot.”
Mr. Levi was to be buried in the same historic African-American cemetery that holds the remains of his mother. Back home in Orange.
But Mr. Levi never had much choice. He was sent first to an institution and then to Iowa, where he and other men with intellectual disabilities worked in virtual servitude at a turkey-processing plant for decades. He never made it back to Orange.
Mr. Levi — a claimant in a successful lawsuit by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that championed proper pay and working conditions for people with disabilities — died on April 23 at his home in Waterloo, Iowa, after contracting the novel coronavirus, according to Paula Passe, one of his court-appointed guardians. He was 73.
Mr. Levi was born in Orange on Aug. 19, 1946, to Ernest and Rosalie Levi. His father was a mill worker, his mother a hotel housekeeper. He lived with cousins until he was 19, when he was taken to a Texas state school in Mexia, more than 200 miles away.
He won gold medals at statewide track meets for special schools, sang with a traveling gospel choir and knew how to summon music with a comb or a couple of spoons.
In 1974, Mr. Levi was sent to work for Henry’s Turkey Service, which then dispatched him and other men with disabilities 1,000 miles north to Muscatine County, Iowa, where the company had a contract with a turkey-processing plant.
Mr. Levi specialized in soothing the creatures that he sent swinging on shackles toward the kill room. “I pat ’em on the belly when I get ’em on the shackle,” he once recalled. “I say, ‘OK, OK, Tom, quieten down.’”
As recounted in The New York Times and in an online Times documentary, the men were paid the same $65 a month for decades, in a perversion of a labor law that allowed people with disabilities to be paid less than what a nondisabled person was paid for the same job. Never given options about employment or housing, the men were forced to live in an old school converted into a bunkhouse.
In 2009, after years of inaction, government agencies evacuated the bunkhouse, which had devolved into a fetid firetrap of neglect. Mr. Levi had a broken kneecap, among other health problems, including a depression so deep that he sometimes screamed at night.
In 2013, the E.E.O.C won its federal lawsuit against Henry’s Turkey Service. By then the Muscatine County officials serving as his guardians had arranged for Mr. Levi to live with three bunkhouse brothers in a supervised setting in Waterloo.
In retirement, Mr. Levi became active in a local church, took vacations and enjoyed dine-and-dance dates with his girlfriend. He often wore Mardi Gras beads and kept spoons tucked in a sock, in case of a sudden need for music.
Mr. Levi talked often of returning to Orange, but his family members had either died or could not be found. After his death, though, Mr. Canino and The Times located a few relatives.
“They took him away so long ago,” Claudette Owens, a distant cousin, said. “Nobody even knew that he existed.”
But Laura Owens, a first cousin in a nursing home near Orange, remembered Mr. Levi living with her family in that shotgun house.
“Playing the comb,” she said. “And singing a lot.”
Mr. Levi was to be buried in the same historic African-American cemetery that holds the remains of his mother. Back home in Orange.
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