After graduating from Central High School in 1932, he entered, studied briefly at Gratz College, and became a leader of the Young People"s Socialist League before receiving his Bachelor of Arts in History from Temple in 1936. Immediately after graduation he took a job as a teacher with the Works Progress Administration"s Workers’ Program. He joined the American Federation of Teachers and became the secretary of his local before the age of 22.
From 1940 until 1942 he worked for the Pennsylvania Department of Public Assistance as a social worker Ben continued to work as a field organizer through the merger of the American Federation of Labor with the Chief Information Officer in 1955 (mergers of local affiliates proceeded slowly over the next decade in Philadelphia). At victory, the new local became the largest in the state.
Ben Stahl worked until 1969 as a field organizer for the American Federation of Labor-Congress-Chief Information Officer, when he became the Regional Director of the American Federation of Labor-Congress-Chief Information Officer"s Human Resources Development Institute.
He held this position until retirement in July 1982. In 1986 Mayor Wilson Goode appointed him Commissioner of the Philadelphia Commission on Human Relations.
Throughout his working years and well into retirement he involved himself with numerous historical, labor, human rights, and civic organizations, which include: Jewish Labor Committee Jewish Employment and Vocational Service Communications Workers of America Local 189 Garment Industry Board of Philadelphia Philadelphia Federation of Teachers United Farm Workers Labor Union Bicentennial Louisiana Communidad Hispana: Project Mushroom, El Centro Esperanza Greater Philadelphia First Corporation Greater Philadelphia Urban Affairs Coalition Philadelphia Unemployment Project Regional Council of Neighborhood Organizations Offender Aid and Restoration People"s Emergency Center Vocational (ACCE).
After graduating from Central High School in 1932, he entered Temple University, studied briefly at Gratz College, and became a leader of the Young People"s Socialist League before receiving his Bachelor of Arts in History from Temple in 1936.
