Arthur Henry Carl Heiden was born on Thursday, August 29, 1912 in the family house at 8861 Dixon Road in Raisinville Township. He was the 8th of the 13 children born to William Carl and Mary (Rambow) Heiden.

He was baptized at St Matthew Lutheran Church as Arthur Heinrich Carl Heiden by Reverend F.C. Beitelsbacher. Carl and Magdeleana Rath were his godparents.

Art spent his early years working on the family farm with his brothers and sisters. In those days, draft horses were used to till the fields and Art had his favorites. He also found time to play a little baseball in the meadows and to hunt pheasants in the fall.

He attended nearby Bridge School through the eighth grade when he received his diploma from the State of Michigan. Although he wanted to go on to high school very badly, in those days a person had to find his own transportation to Dundee or Ida each day to attend. This was not an option for Art at that time.

In the 1930 U.S. census, when he would have been 18 years old, Art was listed as a farm worker living at the Fred Degner place just northwest of Ida at 7883 W. Dunbar Road.

On March 3, 1934, Art married Mildred Mae Roggerman from Dundee. Mildred was born on Friday, September 4, 1914.  Over the next 24 years, they became parents of 7 children, 4 boys and 3 girls. One child, a boy, died shortly after birth in 1951.

Mildred was a 1931 graduate of Dundee High School. She was baptized at the Rea, Michigan M.P. Church on February 1, 1926 at the age of 12. After her marriage to Art, she completed her confirmation into St Matthew Lutheran Church on May 3, 1936.

After their marriage, Art worked on farms including the Butler farm on South Custer Road. In the 1930's, he got a job as a welder at the Monroe Auto Equipment Company where he worked for 29 years until the early 1960's. When the factory moved out of town, Art worked for a few years at the Wolverine Fabricating factory in Dundee on the site of the historic Ford Mill plant on the River Raisin. He finished his working years with 10 years at Dundee Products, retiring in 1977.

In addition to working in the factory, Art always farmed on land he rented from others. In the late 1940's and early 50's he milked cows and worked the Harold Laskey Farm at 12444 Dixon Road. near the corner of Alford Road. After Mr. Laskey died in the mid-1950's, the family moved to a small house at 8864 Dixon Road, across from the family homestead.

After William F. and Helen (Henning) Heiden left the Sucik farm at 8420 Dixon Road to return to the family home farm, Art and his family rented the farm. They lived there until the mid-1970's when they moved back to the house at 8864 Dixon where Art lived until his death in 1985.

At times, Art rented land on several other farms in the area including the Albert Miller place on South Custer, the Fuller farm on Alford Road and the Irish farm on Dixon Road. From the mid-1940's on, the family lived in a total of 4 different houses all located on Dixon Road.

Mildred kept very busy raising the children and attending to the house. She enjoyed crocheting, cross word puzzles and participating in quilting bees where she and others pieced together bits of cloth to form beautiful quilts. In her "spare" time, she developed the skill for hanging wall paper using the flour paste commonly used in those days.

Art and Mil enjoyed playing cards with their friends and relatives. It was not unusual to find them playing euchre or clubs with another couple around the kitchen table on a Friday or Saturday night. They both enjoyed following the Detroit Tigers. Art often joined a bus load of parishioners from St Matthew Lutheran Church to attend "Lutheran Night" at the old Briggs Stadium during the 1950's.

Arthur Heiden passed away on June 18, 1985 at the age of 72 after suffering the effects of emphysema for a number of years. He is buried in the cemetery at St Matthew Lutheran Church on Ida Maybee Road.