Ben Schwartzwalder, former Syracuse University football coach, remembered too as a World War II hero
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Dick Case, Post-Standard columnist The Post-Standard
on May 27, 2012 at 1:59 AM, updated May 27, 2012 at 9:49 AM
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Peter Chen / The Post-Standard Jim Jerome (left), of Geddes, and Ed Kochian, of Spafford, stand next to Floyd "Ben" Schwartzwalder's grave at Onondaga County Veterans Memorial Cemetery in Syracuse.
“Nobody knows much about Ben Schwartzwalder as a man and a soldier,” Ed Kochian is saying. “What a story!”
Mostly, we remember Floyd “Ben” Schwartzwalder as Syracuse University’s successful head football coach, 1949 to 1973. He also was a hero of World War II. Ben died in 1993 at the age of 84.
We’re standing in front of one of the flat and simple granite monuments in the Onondaga County Veterans Memorial Cemetery. They’re all alike – some 5,072 of them spread across several acres next to Howlett Hill Road, west of Syracuse.
This is Ben’s final resting place and it’s a spot of honor for the two men standing with me, Jim Jerome, of Geddes, who played for Ben in the coach’s last year at Syracuse. Jim’s a big guy; he looks like the former Syracuse defensive end and Jets and Patriots pro player he once was. His friend is Ed Kochian, of Spafford, the retired deputy county executive.
View full size Ben Schartzwalder
They’re both huge fans of Ben Schwartzwalder, the patriot. They came to their reverence late.
“Sure, he told us guys stories once in a while,” Jim’s saying. “In his Sergeant York (Alvin, the World War I hero) moments. About jumping out of airplanes. Most of what I know about Ben’s military service, I’ve learned since he died.”
Jim Jerome was one of the coach’s players who gathered in Hendricks Chapel for Ben’s funeral, back in 1993. Jim’s been an avid student of the man ever since. What-do-ya want to know about Captain Ben? One of Jim’s prized possessions is the DVD made for his widow Reggie’s 100th birthday this year.
Service today
A Memorial Day service will be held at 10:30 a.m. today at Onondaga County Veterans Memorial Cemetery, 4069 Howlett Hill Rd.
The same for Ed Kochian, who grew up in Syracuse following the SU football team and its Hall of Fame coach. He knew Ben was an 82nd airborne officer who jumped out of an airplane above Normandy and that he was buried in the county’s Veterans Memorial Cemetery “but didn’t know much more.” Until he walked the beaches at Normandy in the summer of 2010 as part of a veterans tour group.
John Berry / The Post-Standard, file photo, 2011 This is the military identification card for former Syracuse University football coach Floyd “Ben†Schwartzwalder, who served in the U.S. Army during World War II.
“I was determined to visit the gravesite after returning home and to learn more of Ben’s military history,” Ed wrote in an article about the trip after he came back.
In the article, he revealed a previously unpublicized visit to Ben’s burial place by the entire SU football team, and their coaches, just before a game and Veteran’s Day in 2010. Coach Doug Marrone asked that there be no publicity about the visit.
This is Ed’s description of the event: “I decided to approach the SU football team with a suggestion to honor Ben Schwartzwalder on Veteran’s Day. They immediately embraced the idea without hesitation...
“After several preparatory meetings, we agreed on a planned recognition that would enable players to realize the rich tradition of leadership in sports and in life that had preceded them...It was agreed that I would give a briefing on Coach Ben’s military record after the team breakfast on the chosen day...
“After the player briefing, I asked the team tri-captains to come forward. I gave them a container of sand from Omaha Beach to carry to the Veteran’s Cemetery. At about 11:45 a.m., 80 young men and coaches dressed in suits, sports jackets and neckties alit from team buses at the cemetery and walked quietly to the gravesite...the team formed a semi-circle around the marker.
“Two players laid a wreath at the head of the marker. The tri-captains came forward as planned. They cautiously and reverently poured the sand around the perimeter. Coach Marrone stepped forward and he spoke to the team, about the man, Floyd ‘Ben’ Schwartzwalder, and led everyone in a prayer, aloud.
“The team then quietly and in an orderly, respectful manner, walked back to their buses to depart for their road trip to Rutgers University. Several paused at the marker and some knelt to touch the gravestone...”
Ed had told the players that Ben was a superb athlete in high school and college in West Virginia and was coaching high school football when he joined the Army. He was 33 when Pearl Harbor was attacked by Japan Dec.7, 1941. He entered the service two months later. He volunteered for airborne.
A veteran remembers
Leon Snow is 88 and, like Ben Schwartzwalder, is a veteran of the Normandy Invasion of June 1944. He lives in Syracuse and says although he never met the SU coach, he knows of his reputation.
Leon was in the Army quartermaster corps and was unscathed when he was mustered out of the service in 1946. He recalls jumping out of a landing craft in the rain about 5 a.m. on the first day of the invasion. “We got a lot of shelling,” Leon says.
He saw the airborne fighters floating to the ground. Some (such as Ben Schwartzwalder) landed in rivers. Some got hung up on church steeples. Some flew into the war zone in gliders, let loose from the backs of motorized aircraft, he explained.
Leon guarded POWs when the war ended in Europe. He came home and went to work for Borden Foods, in Franklin Square, as a machine operator. He was there 35 years.
(Ed Kochian recently met a Normandy veteran. The senior told him he couldn’t stand Ben as they trained for the Normandy invasion. “In the battle,” the man explained, “I was thankful he worked us so hard.” )
Ben jumped under a parachute into furious fighting, back in 1944. He lead his men and earned a Purple Heart, Bronze Star, Silver Star and Presidential Unit Citation.
He lies in Section A of the Veteran’s Cemetery, flanked by the graves of a PFC and a first sergeant.
“They’re all heroes here,” Jim Jerome says, sweeping a hand across the graveyard.
Dick Case writes Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday. Reach him at 470-2254, or by e-mail,
dcase@syracuse.com.
