Carl V. M. Benander

WORCESTER - Carl Vincent Milton Benander was born on September 28, 1929, in Boston Massachusetts to Anders Emery Benander, son of Anders Magnus Benander and Hulda Albertina Hillstrom of Sweden and Mary Konieczney Benander daughter of Kasmir Konieczney and Katarina Konieczney of Poland.

Carl had three uncles and two aunts. He was named after his three uncles, Carl Arthur, Vincent Immanuel, and Ambrose Milton Magnus. His two aunts were Agnes Helena Marie, and Lillian Hulda Elizabeth. He spent Sundays listening to his grandfather, Reverend Magnus Benander, preach from the pulpit at the Resurrection Lutheran Church in Boston. Those sermons planted a seed of unquenchable faith in him that he carried through every day of his life.

He always said that growing up, he had two very distinct parts of his family. The Swedish side was highbrow and stern, academics and high thinkers. The Polish side was more down-to-earth and blue-collar. He listened intently to and marveled at the spirited debates of his Swedish side, but always felt more comfortable with the Polish side, the mechanics and tradespeople, which surely had nothing to do with the propensity of his uncle Stanley to ply him and his siblings with ice cream cones.

Throughout his life, Carl was a perfect amalgam of these two competing sides of his family – teachers and tinkerers. He had a thirst for knowledge and loved to teach. He’d teach anything to anyone, and never tired of explaining ideas and concepts to his children, family and friends. At the same time, he had an innate curiosity and loved to know how things worked. That radio is broken? Take it apart and see what’s wrong with it! Kids, gather ‘round, let me show you how to re-solder a transistor. He knew electronics and carpentry, small engine repair and masonry. He could build a house from scratch and frame and plumb and wire the whole thing. Drywall. Flooring. Painting. Concrete. Digging wells. Fixing cars. You name it and he could do it, and he loved nothing more than teaching his children to do it as well, whether that was their natural inclination or not. When people in his generation shied away from technology, he was the first to embrace it, signing up for computer classes and always seeking to be ahead of the curve. Change never frightened him. Ignorance did. The three things that defined his personality throughout his whole life were a thirst for knowledge and experience, the powerful desire to share that knowledge with others, and the tenets of his faith.

Carl was the second eldest son of five siblings; Anders Emery Benander, Virginia Marie Benander, Bruce Kenneth Benander, Emily Helene Culver, and outlived all but his youngest brother Donald Henry Benander.

When he was a little squirt, not more than five years old, he sold papers on the streets of Boston and would deposit his earnings into his mother’s apron every evening. He spent most of his childhood on the rough and tumble streets of St Joseph’s Parish in Roxbury, MA, where kids learned how to use their fists at an early age. It was a formative time for him and cemented some of his lifelong positions on both hard work and physical and emotional toughness. His elevated test scores gained him admission to a better quality of education and in middle school he attended the prestigious Boston Latin School, where he developed a love of the English language. He told stories about reading books in the Boston Public library until they kicked him out, at which time he’d go to his night job, working at a textile mill through middle school. It was hard times and everyone who could work had to work. He didn’t get much sleep in those years and almost never did any homework. “I got a hundred on the test,” he’d say to his teacher, “I know the material!” Carl would be furious when they would dock him points for not doing homework, which led to a lifelong rebellious streak in him and not a small mistrust of authority. A certain teacher got under Carl’s skin for dropping his A+ to a B- because of missed homework assignments. One winter day when he was eleven years old he and a few friends hid behind a Studebaker and pelted the offending teacher with snowballs until the man fled for cover into one of the ancient brick buildings for safety. He and his friends were summarily apprehended, and the principal paid them back in full with a switch across the hands. He was sore for days but recalling the caper with a broad smile he said “it was an incredibly stupid plan, but ultimately worth it.” Carl worked as a tree pruner in summers during high school, using a harness and pronged boots to scale huge trunks and get to the boughs up top. Carl graduated high school in 1946 from Plainville High in Plainville, MA at just 16 years old. Wanting to explore his many interests and see the world, he joined the Navy in 1947 as an Aviation Electronics 3rd class and served in the Atlantic fleet. It was a high time for him, getting out into the world and seeing so many new places for the first time. He was proud to be stationed on the USS Missouri, the battleship upon which the Japanese surrender in World War II was signed. He earned many commendations and was selected for Naval Aviator school in Pensacola, Florida, but then jumped at the chance when the Navy offered him a full scholarship to attend Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. While he had always wanted to be a pilot, he thought the opportunity for a full ride to college was the smartest thing for him. Carl met and married Gloria Ann Joyce of Troy, New York and in 1953, he graduated with a degree in industrial engineering.

After graduation, he and Gloria purchased a home in suburban Chicago and had eight children: Carl Vincent Benander, Joyce Marie Freudenberg, Carlene Ann Williams, Dale Lee Benander, David Alexander Benander, Eric Kenneth Benander, Christine Susan Benander (who only lived for 2 days), and Dawn Catherine Benander.

Carl began his career at Continental Can Company and later moved on to various positions within the plastics and paper industries. He was a member of the Jaycees Chamber of Commerce and the Plastics Manufacturing Association in Chicago, IL. He attended services at Lutheran Church of the Cross, a mission church started by his brother, Reverend Bruce Benander, in Arlington Heights, Illinois. He was also a member of Faith Lutheran Church in Homewood, Illinois. But most important to him was the life he was building for his family.

This was a notable period of Carl’s life. His work always motivated him, but there was nothing he looked forward to more than being with his family. He made a point to expose them all to arts and culture. During summers he would take the whole family up to Lake Michigan or to the outdoor theater. In winter, he would load up all the kids into his green and white station wagon and take them to all sorts of museums and culturally impactful destinations. From the Art Institute of Chicago to the Chicago Cultural Center, from the Adler Planetarium to the Shed Aquarium, Carl sought to expose his children to as much knowledge as he could.

Christmastime during those years was always magical, and he would pile everyone into the car and take them to downtown Chicago, where they would look at the windows at Marshall Fields and Carson Prairie Scott and have lunch at Ronnie’s Steak House. Then they would have their annual trip to the Museum of Science and Industry to see the ‘Christmas Around the World’ display. Carl was always fascinated with other cultures and tried to expose his children to all of them.

Birthdays during those years were especially fun. With so many kids, one can imagine that “alone time” with Carl was not a very common event. But on your birthday, you got him all to yourself. These were some of Carl’s happiest memories. Getting to be one-on-one with his children, giving them his undivided attention and creating lifelong memories. He’d let each one pick their own present and then he’d take them to dinner.
After twenty years of marriage, he and Gloria divorced and Carl moved to Hudson, Massachusetts where he married Nikoletta Vlahou and purchased property on Lake Boon. In 1972 he had another son, Thor Alexander Benander. In 1975 he bought Bliss Industries which sold gaskets, seals, and leather industrial materials. In 1976 he welcomed another daughter, Christina Michelle Benander. In 1978 he acquired Mechanics Rubber Company and merged the two entities into Mechanics Bliss Supply Company, which is still thriving in the building he purchased for it more than forty years later.

For twenty more years, Carl built up his businesses, and raised his family. During this period of life he was plugging away, riding the boom of the 1980’s into the dip of the 1990’s. Business was good. One day Carl was visiting a company on a sales call and could see the foreman was agitated. “What’s the problem?” Carl asked. It turned out that the whole production line was shut down because of a broken injection molding machine and the company was losing thousands of dollars per hour. Carl took off his suit jacket and tucked his tie in his shirt and said “get me a ladder.” Fifteen minutes later, the problem was fixed and the line was up and running again. The foreman was stunned. “Carl, I got a guy flying in at $10,000 a day to fix that!” Carl just laughed and said “Send him home. It’s good as new.” The world changed a great deal during those years but Carl was consistent as ever, if slightly softer and more pliable than his younger, more disciplinarian persona. Always quick with a laugh, Carl liked nothing better than joking around with customers and friends alike and he marveled at his good fortune. He traveled to Greece and was speechless when he stood looking up at the Parthenon. At the ancient theater of Epidaurus, he started quoting lines from Aeschylus that he remembered from being a boy at Boston Latin. That was one of the most amazing things about Carl: his ability to recall an astounding number of literary references from his childhood. He would easily recite dozens of poems from memory, none more meaningful and special to him than Lord Byron’s epic poem “Lady of the Lake,” from which he could recite hundreds of lines off the top of his head at the drop of a hat. “A stag at eve had drunk its fill where danced the moon on Monan’s Rill, and deep his midnight lair had made in lone Glenartney’s hazel shade…” He attended St. Stephen’s Lutheran church in Marlborough MA, during those years and enjoyed the camaraderie of that congregation. He was not a passive Christian. Every ride home, he’d ask the children about the lessons of the pastor’s sermon and ask them to apply it to their lives. In this way, time passed. His children grew up and began to have families of their own and much to his delight, Carl was graced with his first grandchildren.

But some unfinished business was stirring inside of him. Stones left unturned, cultures yet to be experienced, bucket list items yet to be checked. At the ripe old age of sixty-nine, he jumped out of an airplane for the first time because it was always something he wanted to do, and his children were finally old enough to fend for themselves if the unthinkable occurred. He was the first one out of the plane that bright day in June, 1998, and he landed on his feet with a huge smile on his face.

So began a period of travel and exploration for Carl that put an exclamation point on his life. After reaping the benefits of hard work, Carl felt his professional legacy was in good hands, and decided it was time to move on to his philanthropic legacy. While most people were settling into retirement, in 1998, at the age of 70 he volunteered to join the United States Peace Corps where he served in Nakuru, Kenya until 2000. There he taught courses in business, marketing and management. In his free time, Carl employed his vast mechanical knowhow to fix 100-year-old water pumps, help local machinists repair homemade presses and lathes, and teach the local artisan community how to bring their unique products to market. Word spread throughout Kenya that there was a mzungu in-country who could fix anything, and he would be summoned to all parts of the country to help with deforestation and to repair harvesters and to dig wells in arable land. He also made sure to travel to visit other volunteers in Kenya, see Lake Victoria, climb Mount Kilimanjaro -- in his 70’s -- and go on multiple safaris. Carl was reinvigorated by the numerous 20-something peace corps colleagues he met and befriended in Kenya and the experience gave him a new lease on life.
In 2001 he and Nikol divorced amicably after thirty years of marriage and they remained close friends for the rest of his life.

Upon his return to the United States he purchased a home in Worcester MA, and for a time returned to Mechanics Bliss, but in his absence, his sons Eric and Dale had the business working like a well-oiled machine and he was itching to continue his philanthropic work. Carl met Mary Obwar in Kenya while serving in the Peace Corps. He married her and cared for her son Willy as his own. They divorced amicably in 2008.
Carl began to volunteer at his local church, The First Baptist Church in Worcester, Massachusetts, redistributing donated merchandise and furniture to newly arrived immigrants and refugees. He found it to be incredibly rewarding work. He helped people of all nationalities. Cameroonians, Uzbeks, Kurds, Rwandans, Syrians, Liberians, Burundians, you name it and he probably helped them at one point or another, delivering furniture, helping children with homework, helping parents fill out job applications and submit complicated paperwork.

With his own family all grown up, he made a new family of everyone else. No matter where you were from or how hard you had it, Carl would show up with a smile and a helping hand and pocket full of candy. He never looked down on anyone because as a child of the depression, he remembered what it was like to open your cupboards and find them empty. He would sit and listen for hours about the individual experiences of the various refugee families and then teach them whatever he could about life in America. Learning and teaching. He worked into his late eighties, carrying furniture to third-floor walkups, helping people fill out forms, and attending cultural events. In addition, he took it upon himself to educate the children of some refugee families by taking them on tours of various New England historical sites. He’d pack his minivan full of kids and head into Boston to all his favorite sites. Old Ironsides. Bunker Hill. Concord Bridge. He paid for all of it himself and always made sure to buy everyone an ice cream, the way his own uncle had done for him seventy-odd years before. In 2018, he was awarded the Massachusetts Baptist Multicultural Ministries award for “Visionary and Honorable Christian Work in Weaving God’s Love Across Cultures.”

Carl met Honjuan Liu in December of 2016; they were married in March of 2017. Honjuan was a loving and devoted wife and companion to Carl and was with him when he drew his last breath, peacefully, in his own bed, on January 24th, 2021. He was 91 years old.

When you consider his origins, one of seven children in a small apartment in Boston’s inner city, it’s truly remarkable the number of things he accomplished and all the lives he touched. He lived life on his own terms, constantly sought out new experiences and new lessons and strove to be a credit to his family and his faith. As rigid as he could be with some of his ideals, like his Swedish relatives, he was always game for a good discussion. He was a lover of practical jokes, had a notorious sweet tooth and was a devoted gym rat. He was working out three to four days a week into his eighties, determined to keep his body and his mind as strong as possible. He was always as strong as a grizzly bear, right to the end. Carl was a tremendous hugger who would pound you on the back. He loved to sing and could belt out an impressive number of songs. Carl was never quite so happy as he was when piling people into a car en route to a cultural or learning event. The intersection of information and community is where he made his hay, and he jumped at any opportunity to teach and be taught. He was never attached to worldly possessions because, as he used to say, “you come into this world with nothing, and you leave it with nothing.”

That’s true, but Carl didn’t exactly leave the world the way he found it. He was preceded in death by his first wife Gloria and daughter Christine, and is survived by two former wives, Nikol and Mary, and current wife Honjuan as well as his nine children, Carl, Joyce, Carlene, Dale, David, Eric, Dawn, Thor, Christina and his step-son Willy. He leaves behind 24 grandchildren: Matt, Carl Michael, Alicia, Stacy, Jessica, Eric, Jenice, Jason, Christy, Tori, Ryan, Blair, Ashley, Victoria, Rachel, Tess, GiGi, Ajax, Tuesday, Bear, Viva, Hero, Indigo, and Jago, as well as 19 great-grandchildren: Anna, James, Nadia, Nyla, Kaia, Noah, Jaden, Jordan, Madeline, Evelyn, Parker, Hollie, Julia, Isaac, Samuel, Brennan, Leena, Elerie, and Kara.

Please note that due to Covid-19, a virtual memorial service will be held on Friday, June 25th at 7:00 pm. Burial will be private at St. Casmir's Cemetery. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to the Kenya Country Fund: https://www.peacecorps.gov/donate/funds/kenya-country-fund-615-cfd/

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