Michael Kenneth Heaney, who many called “Mike,” was born in Roselle Park, New Jersey on January 31, 1943 to Helen (Ahrensfield) Heaney and Herbert (“Herb”) Heaney. When Mike entered the world, his father was halfway around it, solo-piloting over Burma as a First Lieutenant in the Army Aircorp. Though he did not know it then, Mike’s future as a pilot, airplane connoisseur, and serviceman, was set on course by the nearly 70 aerial missions his father flew in the P-47D Thunderbolt he named “Helen Highwater” during Mike’s first year of life. After Herb moved his new family to Michigan to earn a law degree and put the war behind them, young Mike spent his childhood playing soldier on the freshly paved streets of the suburban military boomtown of Willow Run, dreaming of his father’s airborne escapades.

Once an attorney, Herb moved the family back to Basking Ridge, New Jersey and began to practice law. In 1951, the family grew with the birth of Mike’s beloved sister, Patty. Showing a penchant for leadership even as a teenager, Mike served as Bernards High School class president, graduating in 1960, and went on to Middlebury College to major in Sociology and Anthropology and minor in Russian Studies. The family grew to five with the birth of Mike’s beloved brother, Peter in 1962. Meanwhile, Mike was active in student life at Middlebury as Chief Justice of the Men’s Judicial Council, President of the Intra-Fraternity Council, Junior Fellow, member of the Blue Key Honor Society, co-captain of the soccer team and, most impactfully, as a cadet in the ROTC program.

After graduating from Midd in 1964, Mike completed Officer’s Basic Training Camp (Fort Benning, GA) and Ranger and Jump School (Panama City, FL) before heading to the Army Basic Training Camp in Fort Dix (NJ) in the fall of 1965 as a Junior Officer. Intending to follow in his father’s contrails as the Vietnam War escalated, Mike volunteered to serve. A health issue prohibited him from joining the Aircorp, so he became a “ground pounder” in the Infantry. In ‘Nam, Second Lieutenant Heaney led twenty-six men of Third Platoon of Bravo Company, Second of the Eighth Battalion, First Brigade (Airborne), First Air Cavalry Division (Air-Mobile).

He arrived on Christmas day in 1965 and his tour was cut short five months later with a two-day ambush that lasted from May 16th to 17th in 1966. Mike was forever changed by his time “in country,” and though he earned a Purple Heart and Bronze Star for his bravery, he returned from Vietnam deeply wounded–physically, spiritually, and mentally.

Mike tried, like his father, to put the war behind and moved to Boston to attend Harvard Law School. While there, he ran into Carol Jean Olmsted (Middlebury, ‘65) in The Coop and the two were soon married. After earning his J.D. in 1970, Mike and Carol moved into a church-turned house in Maryland and he began practicing law in Washington, D.C. Their first daughter, Bridget, arrived in 1972.

But Maryland was too far from home. In 1975, Mike moved his family into an 1800s farmhouse in Califon, New Jersey on seven acres, surrounded by corn and hay fields and complete with several barns, the main one of which he and Carol self-designed and later converted into a home. Within two years, Mike and Herb founded a private practice together: Heaney & Heaney Law Offices in Bernardsville. That same year, 1977, his second daughter, Shannon was born. They were joined in 1980 by his first son, Seamus.

Even as Mike suffered from untreated PTSD and alcoholism, he found peace hosting friends and family at “the farm.” He found joy tinkering in his woodshop, playing racquetball, coaching and playing soccer, offroading in his Toyota truck, flying in his two-person Cessna (with daughter Bridget as the co-pilot!), and travelling, particularly summer trips with his family to two places he had loved since before the war: Taddousac, Canada, where he enjoyed whale watching and mostly getting his French right, and Niantic, Connecticut, where his parents had a riverside summer cottage in the small community of Saunders Point. Mike was well-respected wherever he had a home, serving as president of the Oswegatchie Hills Club in Niantic, town prosecutor in Bernardsville, and for three years, elected mayor in Tewksbury Township.

In 1984, Mike’s journey of deeper healing began when Carol gathered the loving support of a small group of friends and family to help him make the life-changing decision to voluntarily enter rehab. Mike returned with a new lease on life and, though a painful period followed in the mideighties with a divorce from Carol and the sudden death of his father, he stayed the course by continuing to practice law and finding a new calling through Maine’s Hurricane Island Outward Bound School (HIOBS). Here Mike led adventure courses for Vietnam veterans with PTSD. He also joined a group of Vietnam vets who travelled to Uzbekistan in the former Soviet Union to spend several weeks with a group of Soviet-Afghan War vets. Through the sharing of war stories and companionship with these survivors, Mike formed deep friendships and moved forward on the road to recovery, which included entering a PhD program in American History at Rutgers University and where–encourged by one of his professors–he began writing his combat memoir.

At HIOBS, Mike met fellow instructor and newly ordained reverend Lucia Jackson. They were married in 1990 and settled first in Bernardsville, NJ, where they had two sons, Micah (1994) and Asher (1997). In 2000, after thirty years in law, Mike sold Heaney & Heaney as the family transitioned to Madison, Connecticut. Their proximity to the Niantic cottage–in which his mother Helen now lived year-round, and across from which brother Peter and his family lived–enabled frequent, soul-nourishing family gatherings. Lucia served as an associate pastor in North Haven and Mike adjuncted at Trinity College, teaching about aviation and the Vietnam War. In Connecticut, AA Groups were essential to Mike’s sobriety and PTSD management, which continued into his Vermont years.

In 2007, Lucia was called to a solo pastor position in Hartland, Vermont and the family moved into a Victorian home where Mike set up a library/office, complete with a pulpit from the

Maryland church-house and built-in shelves (and shelves!) of books. There, he finally earned his PhD with a 700-page dissertation that painstakingly detailed the post-war stories of 100 volunteer Civil War Union infantrymen from rural New Jersey and their families. The years in Hartland were fulfilling and joyful. Mike sang in the church choir, was an engaged community member, and served on the Board at The Sharon Academy. He worked on his memoir with a cherished group of newfound fellow writers, continued teaching, and spoke publicly at Memorial and Veteran’s Day events.

In 2008, Mike sojourned on an uniquely healing mission back to Vietnam, where he spent time with veterans who had once been enemies, and who joined him as he returned to the site of the ambush where he was wounded. Michael was also extremely proud to be included in the Ken Burns documentary “The Vietnam War.” Telling his story and how his war time experiences changed him were a great gift.

With the Vermont Humanities Council, Michael led reading groups for veterans centered on literature with war, veteran, and healing themes; he continued to find peace in being a healing presence for other Veterans. With his willingness to tell his own story and create environments to honor and invite others to share theirs, Mike’s devotion to veteran projects became central to his journey of recovery. With fellow veteran alums, Michael founded the Middlebury Veterans Give Back (MVGB) group as a way to serve the college. MVGB integrated his contented years at Middlebury with his challenging years as a veteran.

In 2020, Mike's health began declining from the effects of diabetes, bladder cancer, and dementia, and he and Lucia retired to a riverside home in Bath, Maine. With steadfast support and care from loved ones far and near, particularly Lucia, and with integral life-extending resources from the VA hospitals in Vermont and Maine, Mike was still able to enjoy some of his most favorite activities, even in the final months of his life.

Michael left this world on Sunday, December 14, 2025, surrounded by several of his children and his wife. It was a beautiful, snowy afternoon in Maine. He lay comfortably in an intimate room with two other veterans nearby and a nurse, named Michael, also a veteran, keeping him comfortable. He took his final breaths as we sang to him the words of “The Little Drummer Boy,” one of his favorite Christmas Carols:

I played my drum for Him, pa rum pum pum pum

I played my best for Him, pa rum pum pum pum

Rum pum pum pum,

rum pum pum pum.

Then He smiled at me, pa rum pum pum pum,

Me and my drum

Me and my drum

Me and my drum

Me and my drum

He was a dedicated soldier to the end.

Throughout his life, our dear Michael loved and enjoyed many things: writing and speaking publicly, especially with witty turns-of-phrase and references to obscure literature; reading about, talking about, sight-seeing, and identifying airplanes, especially as they flew overhead; whale-watching in Canada; learning and speaking languages, like French, Russian, and Spanish (and, sometimes, in the spirit of friendship and communion, taking on accents to match those with whom he was speaking); soaring high and waving the wings of his Cessna at family and friends below; playing, coaching, and watching his sons and grandsons play soccer, his favorite sport; playing tennis and pickleball, even in the final summer of his life (at 82!); singing folk songs while strumming the banjo or guitar; eating ice cream (as much as possible!); and long, long car rides with books on tape. Mike had a voracious appetite for reading with yellow highlighters, a love for all things NPR and PBS, a subtle wit and learned humility, a wonderful laugh, a joyous singing voice, an encyclopedic mind, a profound intolerance for bullying and greed, a dedication to community, and a deep and quiet love for his family and close friends, no matter where they were and especially when sharing stories and playing games around a kitchen table or living room.

Mike will forever be dedicated to “his men” and all those men and women who have, throughout history, given their lives for causes greater than themselves. In Mike’s memory, we owe them all a deep debt of gratitude and to live our own lives as eternal peace-seekers who fight for justice, truth, and honor.

Mike, Michael, Dad, Grandpa, Seugro, brother, uncle, friend will be forever loved and greatly missed by his wife, Lucia; his five children, Bridget, Shannon, Seamus, Micah, and Asher; their partners Rick, Greg, Imelda, Leah, and Fiona; his grandsons Ashlee and Ciaran; his brother Peter and sister-in-law Barbara, sister Patty and brother-in-law Ron; his nieces and nephew: Rachel, Tara, Elizabeth, Sean and their partners Stacy, Gregory, and Summer.

In lieu of flowers, the family invites you to make a donation in memory of Michael K. Heaney to Vermont Humanities' Veterans Book Groups by check to Vermont Humanities, 11 Loomis Street, Montpelier, VT 05602 or online at https://bit.ly/vth25-support. Or make a donation to your local public radio (NPR) or public television (PBS) station.

A service to celebrate Michael’s life will be held Saturday, January 24th, 2026 at 11:00 AM at the Days Ferry Congregational Church, 50 Old Stage Road in Woolwich, Maine. All are welcome and invited to bring a printed photo of yourself/selves with Michael–or a photo of something that represents Michael–for a physical scrapbook the family will provide at the service and reception and would love for you to contribute to. There will also be a graveside service in summer 2026 in Vermont.