14 | APRIL 18 • 2024 
J
N

W

hen you’ve got a list 
of choices, it helps to 
prioritize and know 
what you really want. Stuart 
Goldstein did this perfectly! 
Back in 1975, Stuart was a 
33-year-old widower of two 
years, with a couple of kids 
and steady employment. He 
was every matchmaker’s prize 
— and sometimes, everyone 
can be a matchmaker. He was 
constantly getting phone calls 
with people trilling, “Have I got 
a match for you!” 
It was like a modern-day 
Fiddler! Stuart actually kept one 
of his yellow lawyer pads by the 
phone and had a running list of 
names of eligible area women.
One day, his neighbor hap-
pened to mention, “Did you 
know that Iris Goldsmith is get-
ting divorced?”
Really now?!
It happened that Stuart did 

know Iris — she’d taught at 
Dewey School in Oak Park 
together with his deceased wife, 
Nancy, and he knew she was 
pretty and nice. She also had a 
kid in elementary school, Craig, 
who was close in age to his kids, 
Kenny and Wendy.
They also had a similar his-
tory, and both had grown up in 
the area. Stuart was from Green 
Acres while Iris had grown up in 
Northwest Detroit. He’
d attended 
Wayne State before law school, 
and she’
d graduated from the 
University of Michigan. 
Stuart pulled out his trusty 
yellow notepad and was about 
to add Iris at the bottom of the 
list but then had a better idea. 
“I moved her straight to the 
top!” laughed Stuart. 
They spent their first date 
strolling around the Ann Arbor 
art fair and then had a pizza 
dinner at Bimbo’s. 

“We hit it off!” Stuart remem-
bered. 
They dated for 15 months and 
things were sailing along nice-
ly when Stuart shared that he 
wanted to get married. Iris, for 
her part, didn’t feel quite ready. 
Stuart bought her a set of golf 
clubs and hopefully wrote her 
name on it: IRIS GOLDS____ ! 
Would it remain Goldsmith or 
become Goldstein?! No pressure 
or anything!
Eventually Stuart reminded 
her about that list of names he 
had on his yellow pad. 
“I told her either we get 
married or I’m moving on!” 
said Stuart and Iris laughingly 
agreed.
Once the decision had been 
made, they didn’t wait around — 
they married six weeks later!
The wedding took place 
in November 1976 in the 
Southfield backyard of Stuart’s 
brother and sister-in-law, Alan 
and Elaine Belkin. Rabbi Irwin 
Groner officiated, and their 
three kids held up the chuppah. 
The wedding was small with 
only 12 people present, and 
life for the busy blended family 
resumed quickly. The morning 
after the wedding, they made 

peanut butter sandwiches, sent 
their kids to school and went off 
to work. (They did eventually 
make up for it. They honey-
mooned the following January 
in Saint Martin.) 
And so Iris did indeed change 
her name to Goldstein. 
“She didn’t have to change any 
of her initials on anything!” said 
Stuart and those golf clubs were 
duly updated.
Iris retired in 2015 and Stuart 
is still hacking away at being an 
attorney, like he’s done for over 
50 years already. 
The couple live in Bloomfield 
Township and are members of 
Congregation Shaarey Zedek. 
Their children are now in 
their 50s and have given them 
seven granddaughters, “The 
Magnificent Seven” the proud 
grandparents like to call them. 
Both their sons live in Chicago 
about 10 miles apart from each 
other, and their daughter lives in 
New York. 
“Baruch Hashem, we’ve been 
very happy,
” reflected Stuart. His 
prioritizing paid off! 

This column will appear biweekly. If 

you’d like to share your ‘meet-cute’ 

story, please email burstynwithjoy@

hotmail.com.

‘I Moved Her 
to the Top 
of the List!’

ROCHEL BURSTYN CONTRIBUTING WRITER

OUR COMMUNITY
HOW WE MET

Iris and Stuart 
Goldstein

The extended 
Goldstein family. 

