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Ben Crosby now manages PNC, camp websites

From his home three miles north of N-Sid-Sen at Carlin Bay on Lake Coeur d’Alene, the Rev. Benjamin Crosby, a retired UCC conference minister and pastor, makes changes every few days to the websites of the PNC-UCC, N-Sid-Sen and Pilgrim Firs websites.

He and his wife, the Rev. Alice Ling, who was pastor from 2014 to 2022 and continues as supply pastor at Wallace UCC—his home church—returned to North Idaho in 2012 after he retired.

Ben Crosby, retired New Hampshire UCC Conference minister created new PNC websites.

“At this stage of my life and the life of the church, how we communicate and interconnect is critical,” Ben said. “Websites are one way to create those connections.”

He uses WordPress as the backbone of the websites he does, noting that it is the basis for 40 percent of the websites in the world.

Ben also hosts the website for the United Church of Christ Zimbabwe, with which he was in regular contact as conference minister of New Hampshire. The UCC Zimbabwe and the New Hampshire Conference had a partnership. He also visited Zimbabwe and Mt. Selinda Mission several times during that time.

When Mark was at N-Sid-Sen, Ben conversed with him about the camp website and began doing it about 2020, doing several re-designs since then. Then he talked with Phil about the PNC website, and again with Mark, now at Pilgrim Firs about that website.

The three websites are more interconnected now.

Ben, the son of a geologist growing up in Wallace, studied sociology and religion at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, graduating in 1968 and heading to United Theological Seminary in the Twin Cities, where he graduated in 1971.

He served three churches full time in Minnesota over 16 years and did about five years of interim work before he and Alice moved to New Hampshire, nearer her family in Vermont. She served several churches in New Hampshire and worked at Bangor Theological Seminary in Maine.

Ben and Alice have been working behind the scenes at N-Sid-Sen since Mark left, walking the grounds almost every day when no one was there.

“N-Sid-Sen is a beautiful place with a spiritual presence that is rare and valuable,” he said. “Alice and I do what we do for the camp and conference as a gift.”

He retired from the New Hampshire Conference and maintains his standing there, so has not been active in the PNC until recently.

Ben first went to a camp at N-Sid-Sen in the mid 1950s. During his early years, he said, Wallace was a raucous mining town of several thousand people. Since the mines closed, it now has a population of about 900, reframing itself as a tourist destination.

When there was a greater population, the Wallace UCC had 300 adult members, another 300 in the Sunday school and an active Pilgrim’s Fellowship. The church was active at N-Sid-Sen.

Ben, who lived in Silverton, worked summers during college in the mines.

“It was a practical way for me to learn why I wanted to have a higher education,” he said. “Work in the mines is a hard life.”

Now, he said, there is a membership of about 20 and attendance of 10 to 20.

“While North Idaho has a reputation for being conservative, our church seeks to be a progressive voice in the Silver Valley,” he said.

For information, call 208-704-1724 or email ben@carlinbay.net.

 

Pacific Northwest Conference United Church of Christ News © Summer 2025

 

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