Documentary retraces pair’s steps into a life’s ministry

Ed Everett Sr. was a man who used vision to earn a living and create a legacy.

As a young man, he ran a neon sign business on Sterling Street in Fayetteville.

Later, in the desert of Mexico, he and his wife relied on sign language to build a ministry to the deaf.

Now, their story is being told on film.

“We all — no matter where we are or where we’re at — have potential to be used” by God, said James Kirk-Johnson. “If you’re willing to answer God’s call in life, it’s endless where that call can lead. We’re using the story of Rancho Sordo Mudo and the Everetts to illustrate that point.”

Kirk-Johnson is executive producer of the documentary “Hearing Everett: The Rancho Sordo Mudo Story.” The documentary is a testament to the Everetts’ missionary work at their Christian home and school for deaf children in Mexico.

Opening scenes of the movie are scheduled to be filmed this week in Fayetteville.

Ed Everett died a little more than a year ago, at age 79. His wife, Margaret, passed away at age 80 in 2004.

From 1959 to about 1969, the couple called Fayetteville home. They moved here from New York. He ran the business Mister Neon, building and installing signs that lured motorists to the likes of M&O Chevrolet and the old Lobster House restaurant.

Visit to Mexico

Thirty-eight years ago, when he was in his early 40s, Ed Everett made a trip to Mexico to help the poor. He came to realize then that a unique opportunity existed in that country to help the deaf.

The Everetts believed that deaf children could be taught how to read and write, how to communicate in sign language and how to learn a trade. For nearly four decades, that has been the work of the home and school mission, which operates on a 500-acre ranch in Valle de Guadalupe on the Baja peninsula.

Students, who come from all over Mexico, range in age from 5 to about 18.

“As a whole, it’s a story of service,” Kirk-Johnson said. “It’s a story of how an ordinary man from an ordinary family can be used by God for great and miraculous things for other people in need.”

Most of the movie is being shot on location in Mexico and Southern California, but the planned opening scenes are being filmed here.

Shooting is scheduled in town from Wednesday through Saturday. Locations are expected to include the Haymont Grill, Buddy’s Bar-B-Que, Fayetteville Motor Speedway, the Amtrak station and other downtown settings.

Movie extras are needed. If interested, call sports-talk radio station WCIE at 484-2843.

John Stillman, the station’s production manager, said it was a good way for WCIE to be involved in the community. “It sounded like a pretty cool story,” he added.

The low-budget independent documentary started production in April. Plans call for filming to be completed by the end of October.

Kirk-Johnson said the movie — being produced through a partnership between the nonprofit organizations Strong Tower Ministries and Gratis 7 Media group — will cost about $200,000.

The movie’s release is scheduled for early spring.

Filmmaker T.C. Johnson is directing the documentary, with Everett family members and the children of the school among its stars.

Rather than being released theatrically, the faith-based film is being envisioned as an inspirational tool for use by individuals, churches, small groups and organizations.

“We want to get people out of Starbucks and into service,” said Luke Everett, who oversees Rancho Sordo Mudo with his brother, Ed Everett Jr., and their families.

Luke Everett helped inspire the change in direction that his parents would take in life, from the outer commercial glow of neon to the inner spiritual glow of doing God’s work.

At age 5, Luke lost 85 percent of his hearing from a series of illnesses. Ed and Margaret learned sign language, and Margaret Everett started interpreting for the deaf at Bible Baptist Church on Hope Mills Road.

Several years later, Ed Everett Sr. dedicated his life to becoming a missionary in the church. Not long after, recalled Luke, his father took a trip to a town in Monterrey, Mexico, taking food and clothing to a missionary who was building a Bible school.

“One day they went on a walk in a park, and a little boy came up to Dad and motioned if he wanted a shoeshine,” Luke said in a phone interview. “It turned out that the little boy was deaf. The missionary looked at my Dad and said, ‘This little boy is deaf and making a living shining shoes. Somebody needs to tell these children about Jesus. They need to be educated.’

“My Dad, at that moment, realized everything that had happened to him,” Luke said. “He knew this was something that God wanted him to do.”

The Everetts sold their Fayetteville home and their sign business, bought an old school bus, loaded up the family and drove across America. In Mexico, they started life anew as missionaries.

In 1969, the Everetts established their ministry in a small rental house in Ensenada. It soon became clear that more room would be needed once a dozen deaf children joined their own flock of six children (a seventh child had married and moved back to New York).

That was the beginning of Rancho Sordo Mudo, which translates into “school for the deaf.”

“They started from nothing,” Luke Everett said. “A lean-to shelter with a dirt floor. Over the last 38 years, God has blessed this ministry to about 27 buildings.”

Over time, his family and the school have reached out to hundreds of deaf children.

“Initially,” Kirk-Johnson said, “we were looking at how the story could be told. As we got more into it, we realized we had to take it back to its roots. And this family’s roots are in North Carolina and Fayetteville. That’s where this family started this story.”