Nonagenarian teaches lip reading

By Mary Alice Garrett

This story originally appeared April 14, 1994 in the News Journal of Wilmington, Delaware.

HOCKESSIN - Mary Wood Whitehurst often whispers to her hard-of-hearing students at Cokesbury Village.

She wants to strengthen their visual skills first, then their listening skills. By separating one from the other, they become better lip readers, Whitehurst says. And that, combined with listening, she adds, will make them "IOO percent better off."

Whitehurst, 92, has been offering free lip-reading and auditory training classes to Cokesbury residents for more than eight years. Many of her students are repeaters who come to reinforce their skills.

They’re familiar with the tricky, often amusing stories Whitehurst tells to make a point. There’s the one about the man who left his hearing aid at home when he went to the zoo. He failed to hear a warning that rattlesnakes were on the loose, and one landed on his feet.

"The boy drove the Army jeep home. The boy drove the farmer's sheep home," she whispered.

"Shall l put some cherries in your punch? Or shall I put some sherry in your punch?" Again in hushed tones.

Whitehurst has her students look down at the floor as she talks, then look up as she repeats the same word. Sometimes, there’s a disparity in what they get. And sometimes Whitehurst stands behind a person and talks — to see what he gets.

She may read a geography lesson and quiz her pupils later to see what they heard and retained.

All are methods Whitehurst perfected while working with soldiers who suffered hearing losses during World War II and hearing-impaired patients at the Manhattan Eye, Ear and Throat Hospital.

Whitehurst relates to the hearing-impaired because she is one of them. Her own middle—ear deafness wame on when she was in her 30s, and she began wearing a hearing aid. "They were crude in those days," she recalled. "I wore it in my bosom. lt had a long cord what went in the top of my stocking."

Today, Whitehurst wears two hearing aids, but her deafness is not the least apparent. She has no trouble conversing, and her voice is neither loud nor high-pitched. She has retained her Tidewater Virginia accent along with her expert teaching skills.

A former music professor from Hollins College in Roanoke, Va., Whitehurst switched to audiology and speech after her hearing difficulties began. She taught lip reading and auditory training to recuperating soldiers in California, then later to hearing-impaired youngsters in New York City. She was a pioneer in the auditory training of children. She said "it was just wonderful" to see the youngsters enter the world of the hearing.

Her final stint in New York was as head of the hearing and speech clinic at Manhattan Eye, Ear and Throat Hospital.

Whitehurst is opposed to signing for deaf children. "l’m rabid on the subject. lt’s all right after they become grown. lt distresses me about the strides that have been made in sign language." Whitehurst would prefer more time devoted to "the lip-reading and hearing approach."

Whitehurst began her classes for Cokesbury residents shortly after moving to the retirement community in l98l. "When l got here. I was bored to distraction."

She got the OK to offer the classes, then spread the word throughout the complex. The eight-week sessions are held annually in the Fitness Room.

Whitehurst. has removed the stigma of hearing aids and taught residents how to converse in a noisy dining room. Some of her students have been with her for several years. There are other residents who could benefit from the classes, Whitehurst noted, but they’re too proud to admit their hearing problems.

Anna Palmatary has had a hearing aid for six years, but wore it "off and on" until recently. "lt made my head feel funny," she said. "I felt queer." At Whitehurst’s urging, she wears it "most of the time now."

This is the third year Grace Margraf has taken Whitehurst’s course. "I just got my hearing aid four or five months ago," she said.

"l’ve had a little problem getting used to it. My daughter insists that I wear it. She and her husband talk in the loudest voices to me. Now they don’t have to shout at me." To practice lip reading, Margraf sometimes watches television without the sound.

A retired physician, Mario Mahru has two hearing aids, but usually wears only one. Whitehurst is trying to convince him that using two aids "is a more normal way of hearing."

Whitehurst ended a recent session by telling students to return next week with "your greatest problem and a copy of your audiogram."

Margraf couldn’t wait. '”l would like to know what makes a hearing aid whistle," she said. "Too much volume, usually," said Whitehurst.

Besides working with Cokesbury’s hearing-impaired, Whitehurst directs a chorus of more than 20 residents who perform a concert each October.

Whitehurst is as widely known at Cokesbury for her chorus as for her classes.

"Mary Wood is the heart and soul of music at Cokesbury," said Edward H. Rosenberry, a retired professor and resident.