Ben Sylvester, son of Ruth Mills, ’12 is the prototype for the term, CHS Alumni. After graduating from CHS in 1942, Ben served his country for two years in the Philippines during WWII. After his return from the war, he entered college, received degrees from both Harvard (B.A.) and Oxford (B.A. and M.A.), and began an over 40 year teaching career at Choate Rosemary Hall in Connecticut where he taught history and coached crew. At the same time, Ben never forgot his “home” high school (CHS), particularly those CHS classmates who also served during WWII, and to that end, he provided countless hours of his time doing research, as well as providing significant financial support, for projects related to those CHS graduates who became casualties of WWII. His quest to honor those who had served included establishing a CHS Memorial Scholarship for Jim Stryker, a WWII classmate killed in Germany, and his financing of the binding of books which included students’ research on CHS WWII casualties. He also provided donations to the CHS Foundation to provide assistance for research being done by CHS American history students and for the restoring and moving of the War Memorial Plaques to the West Entrance at Central.
Ben passed away in 2024 at the age of 99.