William Perry is blind and wheelchair-bound, but still a commanding figure at the age of 76. The retired Milwaukee steelworker, who weighs more than 250 pounds, holds his head erect and speaks in a warm baritone--now somewhat enfeebled by stroke--that once must have rivaled Paul Robeson's. On a chilly Tuesday in early June, Perry and his daughter Alicia Treadwell, who has cared for him for seven years, go through their morning routine, just as they have for the past 2,000-plus days. Treadwell lays out towels and supplies, while Perry exercises by pulling on bars attached to his bed. They banter and gossip about family, local politics and what Eric Von, the city's best-known black radio host, had to say this morning. Then to the next phase: "OK, Daddy, you clean yourself up. I'll start on breakfast. Go to 9 o'clock on your table, and you've got powder, deodorant, skin cream, periwinkle, the Jovan musk--that's the screw-off top. Remember that top?"

Perry gathers his facial muscles before he speaks, but the words come out fluently: "You go ahead, baby. I got it."

When Perry came home from the hospital seven years ago, he had endured quadruple-bypass surgery and a series of strokes. Glaucoma had almost entirely clouded his eyesight. He could not raise a spoon to his mouth, and his doctors expected him to survive no longer than three years. But Perry had one piece of good fortune: Treadwell, one of his sixteen children, was a licensed nursing assistant with training in physical therapy. She gave up her job to tend to her father at home, receiving only a small wage through what Wisconsin now calls Family Care--a program that, among other things, allows low-income elderly and disabled people to hire workers (generally friends or family members) to care for them at home.

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