Atlanta's Cabbagetown: To honor peace hero, community soldiers on

By Tim Sullivan

I last heard from Ben Sklaver in late September, a week before he was killed by a suicide bomber in Afghanistan. He had limited access to e-mail, but he found a minute to congratulate my wife and me on the birth of our daughter. He said he was between Helmand and Kandahar provinces, and that he wouldn’t be able to make it back to our beloved Chomp & Stomp Chili and Bluegrass Festival in Cabbagetown, but that he hoped to be back for it in 2010.

Ben was a reservist captain in the Army, leading a team that specializes in civil affairs. Something I’ve learned from his family since his death is that the casualty rate for the soldiers who do so much to demilitarize the campaign is very high. To the enemy, a soldier with a weapon is dangerous, but a soldier with a message of peace must hold the potential to change the game completely.

Many news outlets noted Ben’s death. Time magazine, ABC’s “Nightline” and others have relayed how Ben was moved to found the ClearwaterInitiative.org after his first deployment to Africa in 2007. His notion was to bring clean water to people who needed it. War-ravaged areas of Africa often see their water sources vandalized in an effort to separate families and communities. A restored well or bore hole can do so much to bring them back together. In small Ugandan villages, he was known as “Moses Ben” for his life-altering work.

Ben relayed the idea to his friends back here in Cabbagetown. Our friend, Greg Schulz, raised funds for ClearwaterInitiative.org at his annual golf tournament, and it was enough to restore a broken well. In the NBC story a few weeks after Ben died, we saw a smiling young villager standing next to a bubbling well and holding a “Schulzie Invitational” sign.

Ben continued to oversee water projects in Uganda from his post in Afghanistan. Upon his return, he planned to marry his fiancée, Beth Segaloff, start a new job with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and press on with his burgeoning nonprofit. His family said he planned to run for Senate one day.

Cabbagetown is a tightknit, six-block neighborhood with a National Historic Register designation. We have a beautiful park in the center of the neighborhood that was built on a neglected piece of land about nine years ago, and now our yearly festival raises the funds to keep it beautiful. We know each other and look out for each other. Ben’s death really shook us.

Today at the Chomp and Stomp Festival, we’ll direct people to the ClearwaterInitiative.org booth to learn more about Ben’s work. Cabbagetown Run Club members will be sporting Clearwater Initiative T-shirts. Beth Segaloff will be running the 5k in his honor, as will members of his old Army unit. His parents and sister will be on hand to cheer on Beth. A neighborhood will stand by, humbled and grief-stricken, yet undeniably inspired.

A moment of silence for Ben will be observed before the start of the race, and a toast to his friendship will be made in the afternoon. I can easily see Ben wryly drawing comparisons to what brings a community together — clean water in Uganda, chili and beer in Cabbagetown!

All of us in Cabbagetown will long remember our humanitarian and inspiration, our neighbor and friend, our Ben.

Tim Sullivan lives in Atlanta.