Virtue, Peter John

Born at Chatham, Ontario; deafness began at 4 from an infection following a tonsillectomy, deteriorating further until age 8. Chatham public schools 1953-1968, Gallaudet College 1968-1973 (B.S.). Statistician for Gallaudet Research Institute, then dormitory counselor at Oregon State School for the Deaf, while studying deaf education in his spare time at Western Oregon State College. Life skills counselor for the deaf in Portland, OR, then an installer for a storm and screen door company. Feeling a call to the ministry, enrolled at Western Evangelical Seminary in 1982, graduating 1984 (M.S.). In 1984, first deaf person ordained as a deacon in the Free Methodist Church of North America at Bloomfield, Ontario. Became a full-time pastor to the deaf in Ottawa, then in 1989 in Toronto. 1991, left the ministry to become executeive director of the Bob Rumdall Centre for the Deaf until 1993.