Don Michael Shaffer

SHAFFER, Don Michael “Mike”, 90, passed away in his daughter’s arms on September 4, 2026, a few weeks short of his 91st birthday. His wife and son-in-law were also with him. He was born in Ponca City, Oklahoma to Dr. Donald A. and Millicent H. Shaffer, who preceded him in death. Due to maternal rubella, Mike was born with a severe hearing loss that progressed to a total loss during his retirement in Plant City. He graduated from Ponca City High School in 1954 and attended Hiram College. He was on the varsity tennis team at both schools. At Hiram, Mike was also on the varsity wrestling team. During a practice early in the season, while he was wrestling a teammate, another teammate nearby was thrown against the side of one of his knees. The injury from that freak accident ended his wrestling career. He later received a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Texas A & I College (now Texas A & M University at Kingsville), a master’s degree in rehabilitation counseling from Oklahoma State University, and a master’s degree in audio-communicative disability from New York University. He also completed all of the requirements, except the dissertation, for a doctorate in education at the University of Arizona.

Mike had a variety of jobs in his adult years, including: oil well drilling engineer in the southern U.S., payroll accountant in Oklahoma City, vocational rehabilitation counselor in Clarksburg, West Virginia, vocational evaluator of the deaf and hard of hearing at Northern Illinois University, and vocational evaluator of the deaf and hard of hearing at Sunnyview Hospital and Rehabilitation Center in Schenectady. He set up the programs at Northern Illinois University and Sunnyview. His final job, which he held for more than thirty years, was as the Indiana state coordinator of vocational rehabilitation services for the deaf and hard of hearing.

In addition to his work, Mike was an active volunteer. He was a member of several service organizations for hearing impaired people, including the National Association of the Deaf, the Hearing Loss Association of America, and the Indiana Association of the Deaf. He served as a vice president of the Greater Indianapolis Deaf Club and helped it choose and purchase its own clubhouse. He served as a treasurer and a vice president of the Florida Board of the Hearing Loss Association of America and participated in meetings of the Tampa, Lakeland, and Orlando chapters. He was elected the first Chairman of the Hearing Conservation and Work for the Deaf Committee by the Indiana Lions Council of Governors for a year. After that, he served as the state advisor to the Indiana Lions Speech and Hearing Board of Trustees for more than twenty years. He also started the Indianapolis Northeast Deaf Lions Club. He helped to set up a program for deaf people at his church, St. Luke’s United Methodist Church in Indianapolis, and served as the secretary and treasurer of the North Central Jurisdiction, United Methodist Congress of the Deaf. He was a volunteer at the Central State Hospital in Indianapolis during its activities for deaf patients.

Another volunteer activity in which Mike participated was as the treasurer of the Delaware Trails North (Indianapolis) homeowners association. He also videotaped the North Central High School (Indianapolis) girls’ gymnastics team during their meets for their coach for several years.

Over his lifetime, Mike received several awards, including letters and certificates from the State of Indiana, the Indiana Association of the Deaf, and Communication Access, Inc. in Florida for exceptional services. In 2004, he received Indiana’s Sagamore of the Wabash award from Governor Joseph Kernan. This is the highest civilian award that can be bestowed by the governors of Indiana.

In 1967, Mike met Katherine Carol Miller, who was a volunteer at Sunnyview. He impressed her during their engagement by walking on his hands at age 32! They married in Schenectady in August 1968 and were married for 58 years, until his passing. They have two children: Margaret Parajón (Gustavo) of Valrico, Florida and Carlton Judd Shaffer (Rebecca) of Dublin, Ohio. They have four grandchildren: Gabriel Parajón, Brock Shaffer, Michael Parajón, and Ayla Shaffer.

Mike had many varied interests: being a cat parent for seven cats and one grandcat, photography, collecting pennies, playing card and board games, reading newspapers and magazines, and visiting home shows. His favorite participation sports were tennis, golf, ping pong, and pool. As a spectator, he enjoyed cheering for the Colts, Pacers, Bucs, Rays, and his children in their gymnastics meets. He enjoyed bicycling and once was told in Oklahoma City to stop bicycling to work, because it made the company look bad. With his wife, he rode an English bicycle and, later, a recumbent bicycle on the Monon Trail in Indianapolis, the Pinellas Trail, and several other trails in Florida. He enjoyed riding his two motorcycles, especially when he lived in Tucson. That pastime ended when a beginning driver made a left turn in front of him as a red light turned green at the Indiana State Fair entrance. He had wanted to be an Air Force pilot, like two of his cousins, but he was rejected due to his deafness. He “got even” by learning to fly small planes and accumulated 180 hours of flying time, but he never took the written test for a license. He brought his flight log to the Plant City airport for a Christmas gift ride over the city. The pilot invited him to fly the plane. After adding an hour to the flight log, the pilot told everyone in the airport, “That 69 year-old man can still fly!”

Mike liked to plant and raise vegetables, berries, and grapes in Indianapolis. One year, he made wine from excess grapes. The wine was good then, but not anymore. His only unsuccessful vegetable was corn, even though Indiana is a big corn growing state. In Plant City, he liked to do yard work, especially blowing leaves off the driveway and yard. He enjoyed road trips, some of which included a tent or one of his two camping trailers. The last camping trip was to Black Rock Mountain State Park in Georgia to watch a total solar eclipse. He took a cruise to the Western Caribbean with his wife and other hearing impaired people. The highlight of that cruise was the Mayan Tulum ruins in the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico. He found out several years later, from ancestry.com, that about 1% of his ancestors came from the Yucatan Peninsula! The second cruise with his wife was on the Mississippi River between Memphis and New Orleans and focused on visiting plantation homes. He wanted to try one more cruise, but that didn’t happen.

Mike already had a small lakefront cabin on Lake Luzerne in New York before his marriage. That was sold on his move to Tucson. In Indiana, he bought a handyman special lakefront cabin on Cordry Lake in Brown County and spent most of his time there fixing it up himself. It has since been torn down. (Sniff!) As the children grew, more space was needed, so he bought a little-bit larger and less run-down cabin on the same lake. That was eventually sold, because going there conflicted with gymnastics.

Mike was preceded in death by his parents, his stepmother, Ruth Green-Shaffer, three step-siblings, and probably all of his cousins, who were older than he was. He is survived by his wife, children, grandchildren, brother-in-law Thomas Miller (Katherine Newhall Miller) of Scotia, New York, and stepsister Lynda Green Nicholson of Garland, Texas.

Mike’s family had a private memorial service at Dignity Stowers Funeral Home in Brandon, Florida. He will be buried beside his mother in Maple Grove Cemetery in Findlay, Ohio, which was his parents’ home town.