Longtime TART Trail Ambassadors Killed In Wednesday Car Accident

John Heiam and Lois Goldstein, two local retirees long known for their volunteer work for organizations like TART Trails and the Traverse City Paddle Club, have been identified as the couple killed in a car accident that occurred on Hammond Road this past Wednesday afternoon. Heiam was 78 years old; Goldstein was 75.

Though not Michigan natives, Goldstein and Heiam had been a part of the Traverse City community for nearly three decades. The couple bought a house in Traverse City in 1995, though both were still working in Chicago at the time and mostly spent summers here. They’d met in the Windy City while working as high school math teachers, and both taught for 30 years before retiring and moving to northern Michigan for good in 2000.

Speaking to Ticker sister publication the Traverse City Business News two years ago for an article about retirees, Goldstein and Heiam said they were motivated to make Traverse City their home thanks to the area’s boundless opportunities for outdoor recreation. As avid hikers, cyclists, skiers, and paddle sport enthusiasts, the pair wanted to live in a place where they could really enjoy those activities. The big city wasn’t that place, but northern Michigan was.

Goldstein and Heiam went on to play substantial roles in the past two decades of Traverse City’s outdoor recreation ecosystem. Before the two even moved here, they were members of the Cherry Capital Cycling Club, the Grand Traverse Hiking Club, and the Traverse Area Paddle Club. Heiam was instrumental in starting the outing program for the Hiking Club – a responsibility he took on as the organization’s vice president. He later served 11 years as the Hiking Club’s president, as well as a trio of three-year terms on the national board for the North Country Trail Association.

In addition to that service, Goldstein and Heiam took it upon themselves to act as something like guardian angels for local trails and trail users. When they biked the TART or the VASA, they carried tools, maps, and a first aid kit with them. They often helped lost hikers find their way home, or assisted cyclists in fixing flat tires. “We sort of see it as our mission to help whoever needs help,” Goldstein told the TCBN in 2021.

In 2020, those efforts and other volunteer work with local trails resulted in Goldstein and Heiam being named TART Trail Ambassadors of the Year.

Goldstein and Heiam were also a constant presence out on local waterways. Both independently and as part of the Traverse Area Paddle Club, they led upwards of 20 river cleanups a year – paddling down the Boardman, the Pine River, and other up north rivers and streams and retrieving beer cans, snack wrappers, and other stray bits of trash. Even this past Wednesday, they had reportedly spent the day cleaning up the Pine River with other volunteers before the afternoon car accident that claimed their lives.

Despite the active retirement, Goldstein never left her educator roots behind. For more than 20 years, she was a common fixture in the math classrooms of Traverse City Central High School, where she worked with students to help them learn and master calculus. During the peak of the pandemic, when volunteers weren’t allowed to go into local classrooms, Goldstein continued to assist math students via email and phone.

“I told [Traverse City Central math teacher] John Failor: ‘Look, I'm willing to help any kids, any time, for free,’” Goldstein told the TCBN two years ago. “[That work] has allowed me to get much more involved. Meeting younger people in the community and their parents, it's kind of cool. I have all these Facebook friends in their 20s and 30s. They're getting married; they're having children; they're coming out as gay. They're just doing interesting things, and so many of them I met through calculus classes.”

Writing about Goldstein and Heiam in an email sent out to newsletter subscribers on Friday afternoon, TART Executive Director Jule Clark said the couple “represented the best of TART Trails.”

“They were quick with a smile and a helping hand,” Clark wrote. “Their benevolence knew no bounds; their laughter and smiles were as expansive as their hearts… Though we feel an indescribable sense of loss today, we are so grateful to have had their light in our lives for as long as we did. And we know their legacy will shine through all the lives they touched.”