Rochester Mayor Trent Odell, right, declared Monday, Jan. 6, “Ben Severns Day” in the city in honor of Severns, left, who is the oldest living veteran in Fulton County.

Text and Photos
By Leah Sander
InkFreeNews

ROCHESTER — The city of Rochester celebrated resident Ben Severns’ birthday on Monday, Jan. 6.

Rochester Mayor Trent Odell declared Monday “Ben Severns Day” in town to mark Severns’ 102nd birthday. The Wynnfield Crossing inhabitant is the oldest veteran in the county.

Odell presented Severns with a certificate at a party held in Severns’ honor at Wynnfield Crossing, at which family and friends were present.

Severns’ niece Linda Heighway noted it was the second time it had been “Ben Severns Day” in Rochester as former Rochester Mayor Ted Denton had declared it so in 2023 for Severns’ 100th birthday.

On display at the party were Severns’ World War II Navy uniform and an American flag from a ship on which he served.

Severns said he’d made numerous trips across the ocean while in the service.

“I went five times to Ireland and went to North Africa and England and France,” he said.

Severns served from February 1943 to March 1946, which included time spent in the Pacific helping after the war ended.

He met and married his wife Eleanor after the war’s conclusion. She passed away in 2001.

Severns has two daughters still living as well as grandchildren and other descendants.

He compiled his life story in the memoir “The Life and Adventures of a Country Lad: Growing Up on a Farm in the Early 1900s.”