Deceased October 31, 2003

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In Memory

Ben Taylor grew up Westfield, NJ, and came to Amherst by way of the New York Military Academy. Ben’s family was an Amherst family. His father was Class of 1921; his uncle, 1904; his brother Ray, 1949, and his son, Jon, 1987. At Amherst, Ben majored in economics, was a member and president of Chi Phi and played midfield on the lacrosse team. Upon graduation (after the usual stint in the U.S. Army), he married Dolores Anderson (Mount Holyoke, 1950) and moved to Pittsford, NY, a suburb of Rochester, where they raised their four sons, David, Richard, Scott and Jon.  His post-Amherst career was spent with the Coca-Cola Bottling Company of Rochester, where he was vice president in charge of the company’s vending machine business.

Ben’s recreational passions were golf and fishing. He and his family had a camp in Canada, where they spent many happy summers and weekends. In recent years, when the cold descended on upper New York State, Ben and Dolores lived in Palm City, FL. Here, golf was the order of the day.

Ben loved Amherst and supported the College generously. While at Amherst (and pre-Dolores), Ben was a member of Chi Phi’s “Iron Circle,” a select group of brothers whose love of companionship (and beer) was demonstrated each weekend until the wee hours of Sunday mornings in the Chi Phi bar. Ben was also noted for, in his senior year, happily driving a red Oldsmobile back and forth across the Notch.

We didn’t see much of Ben and Dolores for most of their time in Rochester. They, like the rest of us, were concentrating on their careers and raising a family. In recent years, though, we saw much more of them, both at reunions and playing golf together in Florida in the winter. Those were good times.

Ben died on Oct. 31, 2003, of lung cancer at his home in Pittsford. His memorial service was subsequently held in the First Presbyterian Church in that town. We, Ben’s classmates and fraternity brothers, extend for ourselves and on behalf of our class, our sympathy and love to Dolores and her family. Ben was a good friend. We shall miss him.

Harry Alheim ’51
Van Tingley ’51