Joe Goldstein passed away on the morning of June 27th. Joe was President of The Meteoritical Society for 2007-2008 and was awarded the Leonard Medal for 2005. He was also a Fellow of the Society since 1968. Joe was committed to the health of the Society, especially the Endowment Committee and was instrumental in establishing the Society's Legacy Program.
Joe had an exceptional career and received many honors, too many to provide a complete list here. He received the Nininger Meteorite Award in 1965 when he was a graduate student. He was given the Henry Clifton Sorby Award of the International Metallographic Society in 1999. He was elected a Fellow of Microscopy Society of America in 2010 "For his leadership in quantitative SEM and AEM x-ray microanalysis, in application of these tools to materials science, and in the education of generations of microscopists". He received the Duncomb Award from The Microbeam Analysis Society in 2008 for "Excellence in Microanalysis, for Exceptional Science, Service, and Education to the Microanalysis Community" and was awarded the Chancellor’s Medal at University of Massachusetts for Distinguished Faculty Lecturer in 2007. Joe has an asteroid named for him. The 15 km asteroid 4989 Joegoldstein was named for Joe in 2000.
Joe received B.S., S.M. and doctorate (Sc.D.) degrees in Metallurgy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1960, 1962 and 1964, respectively. After receiving his doctorate, he worked for NASA at the Goddard Space Flight Center in the Greenbelt, Maryland, until 1968. He was a professor of Metallurgy and Material Sciences at Lehigh University from 1968 to 1993, was awarded distinguished professor in 1973 and appointed Vice President for Research in 1983. From 1993 to 2004, he was the Dean of Engineering at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and remained at UMass on the faculty until retiring in 2014.
Joe is well known in the Meteorite Community for his work on the structure and thermal history of iron meteorites, as well as work with colleagues on metal in ordinary chondrites and other extraterrestrial materials, including lunar (Apollo) soils. He published over 200 articles in peer-reviewed journals and authored, co-authored and edited ten books on electron beam microscopy and analysis and one on "Phase Transformations in Ferrous Alloys". In honor of Joe, the Microbeam
Analysis Society and The Meteoritical Society jointly established an early career development award "to recognize Joe’s exceptional contributions to training multiple generations of microanalytic experts."
Joe will be sorely missed. He is survived by his wife of 52 years, Barbara, his daughter, Anne Goldstein-Factor and his grandchildren, Sophie and Dov.