How Old Is Heather Whitestone? Heather Whitestone Birthday
Heather Whitestone was born on February 24, 1973 and is 53 years old now.
Birthday: February 24, 1973
How Old - Age: 53
Heather Whitestone Death Fact Check
Heather is alive and kicking and is currently 53 years old.
Please ignore rumors and hoaxes.
If you have any unfortunate news that this page should be update with, please let us know using this form.
Heather Whitestone - Biography
Heather Leigh Whitestone McCallum (born February 24, 1973 in Dothan, Alabama) is a former beauty queen who was the first deaf Miss America title holder, having lost most of her hearing at age 18 months.
Whitestone first participated in Shelby County Junior Miss program. While not actually a beauty pageant, the experience gave her the confidence to begin entering pageants. Her first year in the Miss America system, she won the Miss Jacksonville State University title, and went on to be Miss Alabama. She stood next to Miss Virginia (Culen Johnson) in the finals of the Miss America 1995 pageant. When the first runner-up was announced, she could not hear the host Regis Philbin but could read his lips. Surprised, she looked to her fellow contestant for confirmation that she had won.
In 2002, Whitestone courted controversy among the Deaf community when she decided to have a cochlear implant operation in order to hear to an extent in her right ear, the hearing of which she had lost at 18 months. It was implanted by Dr. John Niparko on August 6 at Johns Hopkins Medical Center and activated on September 19. She said the primary motivation for electing the surgery was an incident when she did not hear her son's cries for help. She said that she has not regretted her decision, thanking her family for supporting her.
She has written three books: Listening with My Heart, Believing in the Promise, and Let God Surprise You. She has also spearheaded the nation's largest multimedia public service campaign to identify early hearing loss, which was created by the Miss America Organization and the Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf.
