Sue Scott

Sue ScottPaul Neevel

“Volunteering brings wonderful things into your life that you may not expect,” says Sue Scott, who first volunteered at age 14 in Dayton, Ohio, giving up her recess to watch a classroom for a teacher who needed a lunch break. “In high school, I tutored junior high kids in math and English.” When she arrived in Eugene in 1970, after two years of college in Colorado, Scott volunteered at a care home, reading to seniors, and met a woman there whose boyfriend introduced her to Tom Hinkle. “I met my husband because of volunteer work,” she notes. They got married in 1974, the year she finished a degree in biology at the University of Oregon. They spent one year as back-to-landers in rural West Virginia, and, later on, did six years of work in town plus farming in upstate New York, while she was becoming a full-time mom for their kids Jesse, Luke and Jill. “I have volunteered in every city we lived,” she says. “My main passion is La Leche League, helping people breastfeed. I’ve been a leader and administrator for 37 years.” The family returned to Oregon in 1984 and settled in Springfield, where their second daughter, Anna Scott-Hinkle, was born, with autism, two years later. “I knew it when she was two days old,” says Scott, who is still a full-time mom, and also Anna’s paid personal support worker. Ever since she was a little girl, Scott-Hinkle and her mother have taken jewelry-making classes offered by local nonprofit Kindtree/Autism Rocks, where mom also helps out with sales and publicity. Kindtree/Autism Rocks will hold its annual DANCE! Like Nobody’s Watching benefit event, 7-10 pm Saturday, May 19, in the Vet’s Club Ballroom, 1626 Willamette Street in Eugene.  Find details at kindtree.org and you can find Scott and Scott-Hinkle’s handmade jewelry at Ramona Bear Designs on Facebook and Etsy.