Mr. Ben G. Crosland Jr.

Ben G. Crosland, Jr., husband of the late Helen Lewis Crosland, father of three, grandfather to six, and great-grandfather to eight, died at the age of 93 on March 6, 2026, in Greenville, South Carolina.

Born on February 11, 1933, in Greenville, the only child of Ben G. Crosland, Sr., and Mary Langston Crosland, Ben excelled in athletics throughout his youth. He starred in baseball, basketball, and football at Greenville High School, earning selection to the North Carolina-South Carolina All-Star Baseball Game and the Upper State-Lower State All-Star Basketball Game. A local sportswriter dubbed him “Crosland the Great” upon his graduation in 1951. He went on to play varsity baseball and basketball at Clemson College, where he was a four-year starting pitcher on the school’s first ACC Championship team and served as captain in 1955. He also played freshman football and participated in the first ACC Basketball Tournament.

After graduating with a degree in Architectural Engineering on January 29, 1956, Ben married Helen that same afternoon and the couple drove west to begin their life together in Southern California. While working for Lockheed designing aircraft wing structures and satellite systems, the couple welcomed three daughters—Kim, Kelly, and Kristi—between 1958 and 1961. In 1969 they returned to South Carolina, eventually settling in Toccoa, Georgia, and later Clemson. Ben built a successful career with General Business Services, rising to Divisional Vice President for the southeastern United States, before joining his uncle Emil Johnson at Engineered Specialties, Inc., in 1988. He retired in 2004.

A devoted husband, father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, Ben was a gentleman who treated everyone with courtesy and optimism. A lifelong patriot, he cherished the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and expressed his traditional conservative views through letters to the editor. He formed deep and lasting friendships across all walks of life and found great joy in golf, recording four holes-in-one and remaining an active member of The Walker Golf Course at Clemson until days before his death. A passionate Clemson Tigers fan, he served as president of the Tiger Letterwinners Association, greeted friends with “Go Tigers,” and was honored as the last living representative of 1950s players at Clemson Basketball Alumni Day in January 2026. He was also a faithful servant at Clemson United Methodist Church and First United Methodist Church in Toccoa. He is remembered with love by his daughters, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and the many friends whose lives he touched.