Tom and Sheila's Story:

We met at a rugby beer party in Washington, DC fall of 1973 when Tom was a member of the Gallaudet Rugby team. I was a second-year grad student in the Education Department and Tom was a lowly freshman. He says he tried to ask me out but I thought he was too young, we are 4 years apart so I am the older woman. We were acquaintances over the years. He was a member of the Rathskeller staff so I would see him there as well before attaining my MA in Education of the Deaf. 

We’d meet over the years at Gallaudet but didn’t start dating until 1980 when I was a lawyer working for the National Center for Law and the Deaf (NCLD) on the Gallaudet campus. He worked for the NAD then, on their 504 Project, giving workshops and producing materials on the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. 

One of the other attorneys at NCLD was working with the NAD on the 504 Project and worked with Tom producing materials. I had gone to MWAD, the local Deaf Club one weekend to mingle with the deaf community and tried to meet up with Tom there but he seemed to be avoiding me. Sarah, the lawyer who worked with Tom, encouraged me to write him a note to find out why he was avoiding me so I did. 

We agreed to meet at The Dubliner one weekend and the rest was history! I found out that the person who had invited me and brought me to MWAD was not well-liked there but since I had not mingled with the local Deaf community there, I didn’t know. So anyway, Tom and I had a wonderful chat and one thing led to another. We married in September of 1982, Fr. Tom Coughlin officiated over our wedding and we will celebrate 40 years in the fall of 2022!