Chicago renames street in honor of 19-year-old basketball star Ben Wilson, killed in 1984
By CBS Chicago Team
November 21, 2022 / 7:59 PM CST / CBS/AP
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Ben Wilson was a high school basketball standout on the path to stardom when he was senselessly gunned down.
On Monday, Chicago took steps to make sure his name is never forgotten.
In 1984, Wilson, 17, was the top high school basketball player in the country. He had just led Simeon Career Academy to their first-ever state title. He
On Nov. 21 of that year -- the eve of the first game of Wilson's senior season and 38 years ago Monday -- Wilson was shot and killed by kids from a rival school. At the time, Wilson had just left Simeon High School and was in front of a store on Vincennes Avenue near 81st Street.
On this 38th anniversary of his death, the city renamed the intersection of 78th Street and Eberhart Avenue in Wilson's honor.
The ceremony was attended by Wilson's family, several former teammates, and community leaders including Ald. Roderick Sawyer (6th).
Wilson, a 6-foot-8 forward, being recruited by the nation's top college basketball programs, among them DePaul, Indiana, and Illinois.
Wilson had decided years before he was gunned down not to get involved in gang activity. On a talk show on which he appeared with the activist Father George Clements, Wilson said he was focusing on being a winner.
"I have a goal and I want to be successful, and so I do what it takes to be successful. And that is, you know, when I get home I study, do my work, and go to class," he said on the talk show, in a clip that appeared in a 1984 report by CBS 2's John Davis.
But Wilson was still shot and killed, following a quarrel and scuffle on Vincennes Avenue.
On Friday, Nov. 24, a wake and vigil for Wilson was held at Simeon High School in the days after he was gunned down. Hundreds of mourners turned out – friends, schoolmates, and even people who only knew of him but did not know him. The line to get in stretched the length of the building and a city block beyond. Mayor Harold Washington attended the vigil and spoke to Wilson's father, and former Mayor Jane Byrne was also in attendance.
Meanwhile, there were calls for gun control and greater efforts to prevent gang violence.
"We've got to do something to keep the guns and knives out of schools and out of the hands of youngsters. The federal government should act – very quickly, I think – on gun control," said then-Ald. Eugene Sawyer (6th), later the city's acting mayor and also father of the current alderman.
Wilson's funeral service was held at the headquarters of the Rev. Jesse Jackson's Operation PUSH – now the Rainbow PUSH Coalition – the day after the wake and vigil. Mayor Washington also spoke at the funeral, promising to make an announcement about fighting gun crimes control the following week.
The gunman, William Moore -- who attended nearby Calumet High School at the time -- served 19 years and nine months in prison before his release in 2004.
After freed from prison, Moore too learned the pain that comes from gun violence. His son was shot to death in 2017.
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