danthecavingman
Member
Sad news,
Just noticed on Peak District Caving that Keith "Ben" Bentham died at the end of August from cancer. Although he was stubborn and a bit of an awkward bugger his contibution to Derbyshire caving was huge, especially the work he did in the Lathkill area. The bypass to the Wind Tunnel in Peak Cavern was also his doing and resulted in the discovery of the White River Series. Some of his projects were controversial and upset a few people but that never seemed to bother him.
I caved with Ben a few times and I think all the trips I went on with him eventually led to more cave being found even if some of it was obscure. My enduring memory of Ben was of him spluttering like a half drowned rat on in trip in Bagshaw. We had gone up to Namread Aven to see if the sump was open hoping to get through to the Hollywood Bowl. There were a couple of inches of airspace and we had to knock flakes of the roof to get through - Ben never liked getting wet and some strong language was uttered on the other side.
Ben had given up caving last time I saw him which was at P.B.Smith's funeral. He said he had done caving and he had decided he was going to climb every single Munroe in Scotland and deliberately spent the night on Ben Macdui looking for the "Old Man of the Mist". That's exactly how Ben worked - he was determined and when something was "done" he would move on.
I'm sure he will be missed by many Derbyshire cavers who knew him.
RIP Ben.
Just noticed on Peak District Caving that Keith "Ben" Bentham died at the end of August from cancer. Although he was stubborn and a bit of an awkward bugger his contibution to Derbyshire caving was huge, especially the work he did in the Lathkill area. The bypass to the Wind Tunnel in Peak Cavern was also his doing and resulted in the discovery of the White River Series. Some of his projects were controversial and upset a few people but that never seemed to bother him.
I caved with Ben a few times and I think all the trips I went on with him eventually led to more cave being found even if some of it was obscure. My enduring memory of Ben was of him spluttering like a half drowned rat on in trip in Bagshaw. We had gone up to Namread Aven to see if the sump was open hoping to get through to the Hollywood Bowl. There were a couple of inches of airspace and we had to knock flakes of the roof to get through - Ben never liked getting wet and some strong language was uttered on the other side.
Ben had given up caving last time I saw him which was at P.B.Smith's funeral. He said he had done caving and he had decided he was going to climb every single Munroe in Scotland and deliberately spent the night on Ben Macdui looking for the "Old Man of the Mist". That's exactly how Ben worked - he was determined and when something was "done" he would move on.
I'm sure he will be missed by many Derbyshire cavers who knew him.
RIP Ben.