On October 1, 2014, our renovated music room was dedicated to Mr. Bennett Boskey, former Board of Trustees Chair and devoted champion of Primary Day. The children sang a special song in honor of Mr. Boskey which was recorded and will be presented to him along with a thank you card signed by all the children and staff.

Mr. Bennett Boskey was quietly at the helm of The Primary Day School since its beginning years. Although he was in the background, his mark was indelibly stamped on the school. He served on the school’s board from 1954 until 2012 and was the Chairman for many of those years. 

In 1954, Mr. Boskey was a young attorney with a general law practice and a friendship with Robert C. Diegert, Chairman of Primary Day’s Board of Directors. Mr. Diegert asked “a favor” of Mr. Boskey, following which Mr. Boskey became a member of the Board of Directors and legal counsel to the school. Mr. Boskey provided much needed legal guidance and direction to Mr. Diegart and Mr. David Yerkes, the architects of the original school building. Mr. Boskey helped them with the organization of the school as a nonprofit corporation, the acquisition of the land, the funding of the building project, the arrangements for construction of the school and the establishment of a foundation to support the school (because the school was turned down by local banks because it was a “single purpose building”).

According to Mr. Boskey, the school, having no assets, could not secure a bank loan for the construction of the building. Even while many parents, trustees, and friends of the school were discouraged, Mr. Boskey and his friends were undeterred, determined to find a way to build the building that PDS children deserved. With Mr. Boskey’s leadership in 1954, a small group of parents, along with a friend of the school, guaranteed the loan that made it possible to proceed with the construction of the school building. So, Mr. Boskey was one of the individuals responsible for Primary Day’s existence today. It is notable that Mr. Boskey and his beloved wife Shirley, whom he has survived, did not have children.
Mr. Boskey never wavered from his commitment to Primary Day. He led every major decision since he assumed the chairmanship of the Board, decades ago, until 2012.

Primary Day is forever indebted to Mr. Boskey for his love for the children of Primary Day and for his life-long devotion to this wonderful school.