Gestures of Friendship

OXNARD — George Mangum had no trouble spinning the giant wheel. Or figuring out the hidden answer, for that matter.

But when it came time to tell emcee Pat Sajak what vowel he wanted to buy, he relied on his old friend--and impromptu interpreter--Darren Galarza.

In a show airing today, the Ventura County pair will make “Wheel of Fortune” history as the first hearing-impaired contestant and hearing interpreter to appear on the popular game show.

On air, they consult in sign language, then Galarza tells Sajak they want an “E.” Mangum spins the wheel most of the time--except for the one time he let Galarza take a spin and it lands them on “bankrupt.”

It was, Mangum signs in his Oxnard living room, a “puny” spin. One that cost the two Point Mugu photographers $23,000.

Galarza, who lives in Fillmore, never expected to become fluent in sign language. He didn’t even know anyone with a hearing loss.

But on his first day on the job at the Point Mugu Navy base eight years ago, sitting across from him was Mangum, who was deaf and didn’t speak. Early on, the two men smiled, nodded and passed notes on a need-to-know basis. Their jobs as photographers for the Naval Air Warfare Center required them to communicate.

“Back then, the only thing I spoke was English and a little Spanish,” Galarza recalls. “But I finally figured out that if I didn’t learn sign language, here we’d be, six, 10 years--who knows?--sitting across from each other, passing notes.”

Mangum himself didn’t push his co-worker to learn his silent language because, after all, it’s a hearing world and “most people never bother, except maybe to learn a few words,” he says.

But when Galarza expressed an interest, they commenced an ad hoc language school on lunch hours and breaks: one teacher, one pupil, no formal curriculum. Galarza would write a word he wanted to know the sign for. Mangum would demonstrate the sign.

By year’s end, the two men could not only hold long conversations and tell wry jokes in sign language, they’d become good friends.

Years later, they still sit across from each other at work--even better friends. Mangum will even go so far as to say, through his interpreter Galarza, that Galarza’s signing “has gotten a little better” over those years.

Galarza signs back that Mangum’s grammar has also improved since they began signing together. The two like to kid around, and Mangum especially enjoys signing mock insults about Galarza in front of a non-signing reporter, which Galarza is obliged to translate.

So when Mangum read a classified ad about “Best Friends Week” on the TV game show a few months ago, he naturally thought of Galarza.

He remembered his pal’s penchant for crosswords. He’d also watched the program himself because it’s more visual than many game shows.

The friends applied to be contestants and were eventually accepted. While they didn’t win enough to retire, they took home a $3,250 holiday bonus, which they split.

“We were in it for the money, but we still had fun,” Galarza says.

Mangum takes his friend in a mock headlock and chides him for the spin that cost them a bundle.

As he sat in his Oxnard home, Galarza did simultaneous verbal translation. Mangum’s wife Brenda, also deaf, followed the repartee between the two with amusement.

So did the family’s Alaskan husky, Siby.

Siby shows no response to the verbal command “shake.” But when Mangum points his finger at Siby’s paw, the dog will shake paws with the best of them. Siby simply happens to be a signing dog, who can also bark. He has been trained to run to his owners and dance for attention if he senses strange goings on around the house.

The home is rigged like a Rube Goldberg contraption. If the doorbell rings, a light in every room flashes. If the phone rings, the lights flash, but at a different sequence.

The phone has TDD, or telecommunication device for the deaf, which allows George’s friend Darren to, say, talk with a special operator, who types the message onto a small computer read out; Mangum can type his response back, in return.

In the bedroom, a regular clock radio with an alarm is connected to a bedside lamp, which flashes when it’s time to get up.

Mangum was born to hearing parents, but his mother contracted measles while pregnant, which rendered him deaf. He attended a school for the deaf in Riverside.

The Mangums have two teenage daughters, Jenna and Greta, who hear perfectly well and also sign as though they were born to it, which they were.

As babies, their cries in the night activated flashing lights to alert their parents.

Mangum sees some advantages to a noise-free world.

“I can concentrate better, without outside noises distracting me. I don’t have to listen to office gossip,” he says. He also can’t hear the angry voices of people arguing or the screeching of tires in traffic.

The biggest problem, Mangum said, “is at work, when the food truck comes around at break time, ringing its bell, and no one remembers to let me know it’s out there.”

One thing Mangum won’t talk about--even in sign language--is the word that won the two pals the three grand. Until the show airs, he said, they’re both sworn to silence.