UKULELE MASTERS NEVER HEARD A NOTE
They’ve never actually heard a ukulele but Jose Hipolito, Jr. and Kenneth McFeeley of Honolulu sure knew how to make them. The two hearing-impaired men became master ukulele makers, creating hundreds of the instruments for more than forty years. The cousins were rewarded for their years of service with a retirement party in September of 1999 at Kamaka Hawaii, where they have been making ukuleles since 1916. Hipolito, who worked for Kamaka for forty-four years, and McFeeley, who worked there for forty years developed the ability to sense the vibrations of their sanding, knowing exactly when they had made the perfect ukulele. “We just kept honing it . . . until it would sound right,” Hipolito told reporters through a sign-language interpreter. Adapted from the September 2, 1999 issue of the Rockford (Illinois) Register Star, Daniel R. Koehler, Davis Junction, Illinois
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