On the evening of January 26, 2015, Ben passed away peacefully at home with his wife by his side, attended by his daughter and his friend.
Benjamin Alvarado was born in Argentine, KS September 30, 1924 to Guadalupe (Alvarado) Carrillo and her husband, Miguel Carrillo. Ben was the second of three children and the older of two boys. At the age of 5 he attended Clara Barton School for Mexican Americans which was segregated.
The little family lost Miguel to long term illness early in Ben’s life and subsequently Guadalupe moved the family into a small shack behind a relative’s house. They subsisted on flour tortillas and beans, vegetables from the garden, milk from the cow and benevolence from relatives. The stress of all that transpired, coupled with exposure to the cold winters that leaked through the un-insulated walls into space warmed only by the wood-fired cook stove, finally overcame Guadalupe’s health in 1929.
Diagnosed with Tuberculosis, her family prescribed Mexico’s favorable climate for Guadalupe’s health and life on a ranch for her children. Ben’s 3 day journey by train and 40 miles by horseback through the mountains to Tangansicuaro Michoacán left an indelible impression on his 6 year old mind, that is bigger than the sum of its parts. And his brief life as a mini caballero was bigger than his tiny frame and lives on today in his colorful descriptions of the food, the sound of Mariachi bands and the echo of horse’s hooves on cobblestone streets and the shouts of caballeros! The only thing larger than the richness of his life on the ranch was the death of his mother. It haunted him.
This series of events culminating in the loss of his father to illness and his mother to death, at such a young age, left Ben feeling forsaken; for much of his life. And the three young orphans were picked up in Michoacán by Guadalupe’s brother Jose and his wife Concepcion Alvarado for the sadder journey back to Kansas.
The children took the mother’s family name as their own in an informal adoption to lubricate the enrollment and education requirements of Osawatomie’s school system. Life as unwanted children with the childless Aunt and Uncle was both hard and hardening. The 16 year old boy was further steeled and fast becoming a man with the hard work of replacing rails for the Missouri Pacific Railroad to accommodate the new war equipment being shipped across the nation. As hard as the young man was, Ben vowed never to work for the railroad again. He kept his word.
At 17 Ben accepted an offer to go with his Catholic Priest who was transferred to Leavenworth. There, he became a handy man, with duties that included car washing, house painting and grave digging. Ben was not allowed to fraternize outside his “own kind” and was excluded from dining with the others and fed in the kitchen until a housekeeper/cook intervened on his behalf “in a most eloquent way” in Ben’s words. And Ben was “promoted to holiness” that very night.
WWII interrupted Ben’s matriculation to holiness and forever changed and framed his life. He reported to the induction center in Kansas City with his “letter of congratulations” from Uncle Sam. And he passed. After completing basic training, he found himself with two weeks and $20 to burn. He used the time to visit relatives and the money to enjoy the Big Bands. But something bigger awaited him.
As fate would have it, a group of his cousins and their friends decided to visit Fairyland Park where Ben’s world was once again forever changed and further defined. Her name was Victoria (Juliann) Ramirez and she became Vicky to him. In Ben’s own words, after teaching her to swim, (hold her breath underwater) failing to find her friends and providing streetcar fare and personal escort back to her home, “My life was changing; I could feel gladness in my heart….” Knowing he was about to leave and might never see her again, he returned the next day to say goodbye. She sent him away with her kiss placed in his open hand and she admonished him to keep safe. As she faded into the background the War loomed in the foreground.
Ben was thrilled to receive all the possessions entrusted to a GI as he never before had anything of his own. But the business end of the possessions sobered the thrill. The Army trained him how to kill, stay alive and sacrifice himself for the greater cause.
Private Benjamin Alvarado landed at Normandy on D-day arriving on Omaha Beach in the second wave. He fought his way into the bowels of the Nazi’s secrets, liberated Buchenwald and watched people kill and be killed all without ever being told where he was, who he was with and why he was there. So he made up his own reason and did it for a girl he barely knew, whose name was carved into the butt of his M1. He forgot what her face looked like, but he did it for Vicky because he needed a reason to live and a reason to return. Vicky gave him that reason for over 100 days in 1944 until they shot a leg out from under him that eventually landed him out of harm’s way. Vicky continued to give him reasons for 70 years after the war. The stories Ben has shared in the most honest of ways, man to man and person to person could fill a book. And the seventy years since could be the movie.
Ben and Victoria were married May 1st 1948. Ben attended the Kansas City Art Institute and worked for Kansas City Poster until his industry and ambition birthed a business out of his home that eventually found its way into the property located in Grandview Missouri.
The Sign Shop at 1306 Main Street in Grandview provided for this large family of 8 which now included 5 children; Thomas, Peter, Daniel, Alicia and Natalie - the couple themselves - and Ben’s younger brother Michael. Mike returned from the War in need of care and once he was found by, and released to, Ben, he and Victoria provided for Mike what he couldn’t provide for himself, until his death in 1989. Ben also searched for and found his father in an institution and encouraged him and received his apology before he died. He had to search for his sister after the war and finally found her in ill health and hospitalized. He buried her in 1988, making himself the final survivor of that small Carrillo family of 5 and again at too young an age to be forsaken.
Ben’s world was forever changed again and he finally broke free of the feeling of being “forsaken” when he discovered as he always said in such a liquid way, “My Lord and Savior Jesus Christ”. His business, his home and his talk changed to reflect his faith. To know Ben was to know a man who knew Jesus.
He went to Israel and was baptized in the Jordan River and was inspired while on that quest in search of Jesus’ footsteps. He returned home in search of a “Jesus Donkey” which he found and named Ebenezer. Ebenezer’s fame eventually rivaled Ben’s own when in time Ebenezer was adopted as Grandview’s mascot. He tried to change the Catholic Church in his new found zeal which was ill received. His search through the institutional world for a church eventually ended in a non-denominational home that he never left. It was the music that had such a draw. If WWII is the book and Vicky is the movie then “my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” is the music.
Ben was tight lipped about his war experience until the 50th anniversary of D-Day. It was then that he began to open up and his stories have circulated through the family, regaled friends, bored children, populated local newspapers and are stored in the Library of Congress. His story was featured by the military.com newsletter on the 70th anniversary of D-Day. They pulled it from the Veterans Oral History Project. By then, Ben didn’t remember that he had served. But, they did and we do.
If you asked Ben in his final cogent years what were the most important things that shaped his life. He would say, WWII, Victoria and my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ; but not in that order.
I hope these words adequately reflect the soldier who survived a war, found his bride and now knows his Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, face to face.
He is survived by Vicky; his 5 children; their children and their children. There are so many, moving so perpetually, that we have yet to agree on the number.
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