Pediatric Rehabilitation is starting a new section in the journal. 'Voices from the Past' will combine two forms of articles. The first will be reviews of, and where possible, republication of the 'classic' articles in the field of paediatric rehabilitation. Summaries and discussions of these seminal contributions will at least be presented. The second will be scholarly studies of historical topics within the fields of paediatric rehabilitation, childhood and disability. Recent research in the histories of childhood and disability is reviewed in this essay.