Everyone becomes famous had to overcome obstacles. For the people listed here, obstacles included the physical disability of being deaf and having to bring a translator to meetings where everyone didn’t speak American Sign Language. Here are 10 famous people you didn’t know were deaf.
Shelley Beattie
Shelley Beattie was a professional female bodybuilder and actress who reached one of the top three in the Ms. Olympia contest. As the result of an aspirin overdose during childhood, Beattie lost her hearing when she was just 3 years old.
Curtis Pride is a former Major League Baseball player who played for the New York Mets and the Montreal Expos. Pride was born deaf but that didn’t stop him from having an amazing baseball career. Today he coaches at Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C.
Gertrude Ederle was an Olympic swimmer and the first woman to swim across the English Channel in 1926, a trip that would result in her losing her hearing. Ederle already suffered from poor hearing as a young girl.
Jim Kyte is a Canadian former National Hockey League player and he was the first legally deaf person to play for the NHL. Kyte was born with perfect hearing, but suffered from a hereditary condition that eventually made him go deaf.
Heather Whitestone was the winner of Miss America in 1995 and the first deaf woman to ever win the title. Whitestone lost her hearing when she was 18 months old and since she was a little girl, looked up to Helen Keller as a role model.
William Ellsworth “Dummy” Hoy was an American Major League Baseball player who played centerfield for the Cincinnati Reds along with several other teams. Some credit Hoy with starting the use of safe and out calls. Hoy lost his hearing at the age of 3 after having meningitis.
Sean Berdy is currently acting on the ABC show “Switched at Birth” and also appeared in “The Sandlot 2.” Berdy was born deaf into family with deaf parents and a deaf brother.
Calbraith Perry Rodgers was an American aviation pioneer who made the first transcontinental flight across the U.S. in 1911. Rodgers suffered from scarlet fever as a child, which left him deaf in one ear and hearing impaired in the other.
Thomas Edison is the American inventor who gave us the electric light bulb and motion picture camera. Due to having scarlet fever as a child, and allegedly a blow to the head, Edison’s hearing was greatly impaired. The inventor described himself as deaf.