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Thursday, Sep. 17, 2009

Bibb teacher struck, killed by vehicle while jogging

Skyview Elementary School teacher Nathan Beiswenger had his life ahead of him. He was young, he embraced learning and he was getting married in November.

Friends and co-workers say he was an avid athlete and member of the Macon Love rugby team.

Beiswenger’s fiancee, Kelly Richey, said Beiswenger asked her to wake him when she returned from the gym Wednesday morning so he could go for a jog.

She was drying her hair when he left for the run.

“And that was it,” Richey said. “I assumed he’d be right back.”

Beiswenger, 26, of Joseph Chandler Drive, died after being hit by a 2003 Chevrolet Avalanche as he jogged along the 4200 block of Sardis Church Road just before 7 a.m. Wednesday.

It was still dark, and the road doesn’t have sidewalks or a shoulder.

Witnesses say Beiswenger saw a vehicle heading toward him so he moved into the right lane, according to a sheriff’s office news release.

Apparently he did not see or hear the truck that fatally struck him from behind, according to the release.

Beiswenger was running with an iPod in a white T-shirt and gray jogging pants with reflectors on his shoes, Bibb County Coroner Leon Jones said.

No criminal charges are pending against the driver, according to the sheriff’s office.

"A GREAT LOSS"

Bibb County school officials sent grief counselors Wednesday to Skyview Elementary, as well as Heard Elementary and Springdale Elementary, where Beiswenger also had taught, Skyview principal Richard Key said.

“He was a first-year teacher with us,” Key said. “He was a younger teacher, and he really related well to the students. It’s a great loss for us here.”

Key said some of the students reacted more strongly with grief than others and were taken aside for group and individual counseling. He said students would be sent home Wednesday with a letter for parents informing them of Beiswenger’s death.

“(The school system) is providing some in-depth counseling,” he said.

Bibb schools Superintendent Sharon Patterson said Wednesday was a difficult day and likely the first time many of the children in Beiswenger’s fourth-grade class have had to deal with death.

“We have to help the children understand that. ... It forces us all to realize how tenuous life is and how we have to cherish every day,” she said. “It’s obviously a very shaking event when someone is doing a normal routine activity and tragedy strikes.”

Richey said Beiswenger moved to the Macon area two years ago from his native Minnesota to teach.

Drexel Holton, a manager at CJ’s Sports Bar and Grill, said Beiswenger often talked about growing up in Minnesota. He went by the nickname “Minnesota” at CJ’s, where he was a frequent customer before becoming a bartender.

Holton said Beiswenger enjoyed fishing, hunting and country music.

On at least one occasion he kidded, “I guess you can call me a Yankee redneck,” said Holton, a manager there.

Grant Goodrich, another manager at CJ’s, said Beiswenger grew to embrace Southern culture.

“He befriended everybody,” Goodrich said. “Nobody ever had a bad word to say about him.”

Richey said she met Beiswenger when he taught at Heard Elementary through her now 6-year-old son who was a student at the school.

“You don’t think anybody could love your kids as much as you do,” she said. “But he did.”

JOGGING

Pam Rogers said a lot of wrecks occur on the stretch of road in front of her Sardis Church Road home. It’s near a blind hill, and drivers often drive too fast, she said.

By Wednesday afternoon, a floral memorial had been placed near the accident site by Beiswenger’s students.

Vanessa Glover, another Sardis Church Road resident who is an avid jogger, said her sister called her Wednesday after hearing a runner was struck and killed by a vehicle. Glover walks or jogs at least two miles a day five days a week.

She said she heard the sirens.

“The first thing I did was call my son. ... We have kids walking up and down the road every morning.”

Although Sardis Church Road isn’t well lighted, Glover said many joggers choose it as a part of their route because of the hills and the fact that there aren’t many cars that early in the morning.

“It gives you a better workout,” she said.

Although Sardis Church Road doesn’t have as much traffic as Houston Road, Glover said she’s recently changed her route to Houston Road because it has sidewalks.

Some drivers are courteous, but many are distracted by cell phones or just aren’t paying attention, she said.

To be sure she can hear traffic around her, Glover said she listens to her MP3 player in only one ear.

“It makes it harder to hear when it’s in both ears,” she said.