A village that helped carry the Heath family forward

On the evening of Nov. 14, 1970, 19-year-old Jeff Heath was at The Varsity on 20th Street, meeting friends for a beer. It was a rainy, miserable night in Huntington. Then, a report came across the television: A plane carrying members of the Marshall University football team had crashed while attempting to land at Tri-State Airport.

Jeff knew his parents were aboard.

He immediately left, got into his mother’s car and drove toward the airport as quickly as he could, taking back roads through Wayne County. When he reached the bottom of the hill leading to the airport, police stopped him. They told him the crash was devastating and there likely would be no survivors.

“At that point, I realized I was not going to have a mom and a dad anymore,” Jeff recalled.

A Marshall sophomore, Jeff had been living in an apartment behind his family’s home, enjoying college life and looking forward to moving into his fraternity house the following semester. Suddenly, everything changed. His parents, Emmett and Elaine Heath, were among the 75 people killed in the crash. So were his godparents, Dr. Herbert Proctor and his wife, Courtney, who had offered Jeff’s parents two tickets for the trip. The Proctors were close friends of the family and had been the people expected to look after Jeff and his siblings if anything ever happened to their mother and father.

Jeff was the oldest of four children. At 19, he was a Marshall sophomore. His sister Kathy, 18, was married and had welcomed a daughter, Shannon, just three weeks before the crash. Jeff’s mother had only gotten to see her new granddaughter a couple of times. His younger sister, Holly, 15, and brother, Kevin, 11, were still at home.

As the oldest of the four, Jeff found himself taking on the role of parent to his younger siblings.

When he returned home that night, every light in the house was on. Friends and neighbors had already gathered, coming to offer condolences and see what they could do to help.

“I don’t remember any individuals who came over that night, but a whole bunch came,” he said.

The university also stepped forward, doing what it could for the family. And as the weeks went by, people throughout Huntington continued to find ways to help.

One person who became especially important to the family was Tim Perry, then president of Guaranty National Bank. The bank served as executor of the Heath family estate, and Tim developed a close relationship with the children, becoming a father figure to them.

“Guaranty National Bank really looked out for us,” Jeff said. “We had a really personable relationship with Mr. Perry, who has since passed away.”

Tim was, as Jeff describes him, “a big piece of the puzzle” who helped keep the family together. His support extended beyond the bank’s responsibilities. As Christmas approached that first year, Tim showed up at the Heath home with something the family had not thought to get for itself.

“I do have a fond memory of the bank — the president of Guaranty National Bank walking into the house dragging a big Christmas tree behind him,” Jeff said.

The family did not have a tree and had not gone out to buy one. Jeff was trying to take on the responsibilities of an adult while dealing with the loss of both parents. There were things he simply had not thought about.

“I’m the head person of the family, but there were a lot of loopholes I didn’t follow through with because I didn’t think about it. There were other things I was thinking about at the time,” he said. “He came forth with that Christmas tree — and at that time, we thought it was gorgeous, I’m sure.”

Another gesture came from Marshall’s home economics department. Jeff’s mother had been making him a long English overcoat when she died. Someone in the department heard about the unfinished coat and asked if they could complete the work she had started.

“I was very proud to wear that coat for years and years,” Jeff said.

Jeff also recognizes that his family’s circumstances were different from those of some others affected by the crash. They had insurance and financial resources, which helped make it possible for the children to remain together in their Huntington home. He knows that was not the experience of every family.

His grandparents tried to help, but caring for four young people proved difficult, and they eventually returned home. Jeff continued looking after his siblings, who were 18, 15 and 11, while also trying to continue his own education.

The family-owned Midas Muffler shop on 21st Street was sold to its manager so Jeff would not have to leave college to run the business. He remained at Marshall, earning a bachelor’s degree in management in 1973 and a master’s degree in political science in 1975.

In the years that followed, Jeff’s siblings found their own paths in Huntington. Holly married Dr. Marc Wilde, and the two still live in the same Southside home where the family gathered after the crash. Kevin also remained in the area.

Jeff’s own life continued to take shape in Huntington. He married Sally Wolfe Heath in 1975. Sally had met his parents only once, about a month before the crash, but became a mother figure to Holly and Kevin and an important part of the family.

Together, Jeff and Sally raised two children. Their daughter, Madison Elaine, carries his mother’s name. Their son, Marshall Taylor, carries the name of the university that had become such an important part of the family’s story.

Jeff eventually moved to Lexington for work in 1990 and retired about 13 years ago. But his connection to Marshall never faded. He still has season tickets, attends games as often as he can and returns for Homecoming to reconnect with friends and familiar faces.

“I became a lifelong Marshall supporter. I bleed green when it comes to the football team,” he said.

More than 56 years have passed since the crash, but Nov. 14 still brings the memories close. Jeff thinks about how different life might have been if his parents had not taken that trip, and about the milestones they never got to see — Holly’s wedding, Kevin playing quarterback at Huntington High and the family growing up.

He also thinks about what his parents would make of the lives their children built.

Jeff believes it is important for people who experienced the crash and its aftermath to continue sharing their stories, especially with students who come to Marshall today without knowing what happened in 1970 or how deeply the tragedy changed lives beyond the football team.

“I was walking the campus as a 19-year-old the day before it happened, and the next thing you know, I don’t have any parents,” he said. “Lives were changed that day. People’s lives were changed 180 degrees.”

Each year on Nov. 14, the Marshall community gathers at the Memorial Fountain. The fountain is turned off, and people pause to remember and honor the 75 lives lost. The ceremony is a reminder of a tragedy shared by a university and a community — but also of the individual lives behind that history and the families whose stories continued long after that November night.

For Jeff, one part of that story will always be the village that helped raise him and his siblings. It was there in the neighbors who filled the family home, the university community that offered support, the bank president who arrived with a Christmas tree and the people who made sure his mother’s unfinished coat was completed.

Those gestures did not erase the loss. But they helped a young man and his family find their footing when the future was suddenly uncertain.

And more than half a century later, Jeff still remembers what it meant to have a community show up.