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EDDIE and the
HAND JIVE Words and images Dwain Hebda
L
Love makes you do strange things; takes you places you might not have expected you’d go and shows you sights you may never think you’d see. For Eddie Schmeckenbecher, communications specialist for Arkansas School for the Deaf, love and American Sign Language go, quite literally hand-in-hand. “I started learning (to sign) at church in 1972. They had a deaf ministry at church and I thought it was fascinating to watch the interpreter,” he
Eddie Schmeckenbecher
says. “I was in high school. There was a girl that was an interpreter. You know, there’s always a girl involved somewhere.” While the romance part didn’t materialize, Eddie’s love affair with signing and the people who benefited from his ministry stuck. Throughout his college years, split between Liberty Baptist College (now Liberty University) in Lynchburg, Virginia, and UA Little Rock, he continued to hone his technique, taking formal courses and interpreting church services and classes for the academic and spiritual enrichment of the deaf.
DOSOUTHMAGAZINE.COM
