Obituary of CV Ben Bennett

On July 2, 2015, C.V. "Ben" Bennett, Jr. died of myeloid leukemia at his home in Eugene, Oregon. He was born on November 16, 1931 in Sapulpa, Oklahoma to Cleon, Sr. and Frances King Bennett.After finishing high school, Ben spent two years in the U.S. Army and served in Korea. In 1952 he enrolled at Murray State College in Kentucky, where he met fellow theatre major Mary Lou Snow, whom he married on June 1, 1954 in her hometown of Paris, Tennessee. Two years after graduating with degrees in business and in theatre, Ben earned his master's degree in theatre from Southern Illinois University; in 1971 he received a Ph.D. in theatre from the University of Wisconsin in Madison.Ben was a professor at Oregon State University where he taught courses in theatre arts, directed plays, served as Director of the Theatre and as Chairman of the Department of Speech Communication. He was among the co-founders of the Valley Round and Reader's Theatres in Corvallis and active in many arts and civic organizations. For several summers beginning in 1977, he was a company member and associate production manager of the Colorado Shakespeare Festival in Boulder, Colorado. Beginning in the fall of 1982, Ben spent 10 months as a Fulbright Senior Lecturer at the National Institute of the Arts in Taipei, Taiwan.Shortly after retirement in 1994, Ben and Mary Lou moved to Florence and later to Eugene, where among his various interests he pursued his love (and frustration) of golf and volunteered his time and scheduling prowess at the Oregon Genealogical Society.Survivors include his wife Mary Lou; a daughter April Bennett-Layton of Portland; sons David Bennett of California and Greg Bennett of New York; a sister, Arleene Dunn of McAlester, Oklahoma; a brother, Charles Bennett of Lamar, Colorado; four grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.The family wishes to express its heartfelt gratitude to Audrey and Missy at Life Passages, as well as the respective staffs of the Willamette Valley Cancer Institute (RiverBend), the Regional Infusion Center at Sacred Heart Medical Center, the Good Samaritan Society (Rehabilitation Services), and Sacred Heart Hospice; their daily endeavors are the living embodiment of care and compassion.Remembrances may be expressed through random and premeditated acts of selflessness.Arrangements entrusted to Poole-Larsen