Benjamin Sheares

Benjamin Sheares FRCOG FACS
Official portrait, 1971
2nd President of Singapore
In office 2 January 1971 – 12 May 1981
Prime Minister	Lee Kuan Yew
Preceded by	Yusof Ishak
Succeeded by	Devan Nair
Personal details
Born	Benjamin Henry Sheares (1907-08-12)12 August 1907 Straits Settlements (present-day Singapore)
Died	12 May 1981(1981-05-12) (aged 73) Holt Road, Singapore
Cause of death	Lung cancer
Resting place	Kranji State Cemetery
Political party	Independent
Spouse	Yeo Seh Geok Sheares (m. 1939)
Children	3; including Constance
Alma mater	King Edward VII College of Medicine
Occupation	Physician academic

Benjamin Henry Sheares FRCOG FACS^[1] (12 August 1907 – 12 May 1981) was a Singaporean physician and academic who served as the second president of Singapore from 1971 until his death in 1981. Of Eurasian descent, Sheares was born in Singapore under British rule and graduated from the King Edward VII College of Medicine. He studied obstetrics and gynaecology and worked as an obstetrician at the Kandang Kerbau Hospital (KKH), eventually serving as the Acting Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at the University of Malaya in Singapore. He later became the Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at the university, a rare feat for a local as usually high-ranking colonial officers held such positions.

Sheares retired in 1960 and was in private practice before being elected as the president of Singapore by Parliament following the death of Yusof Ishak, the former president, on 23 November 1970. He was sworn in on 2 January 1971. Sheares initially wanted to retire after finishing his second term as he felt that he did not have the energy for another term, but then-Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew persuaded him to stay and Sheares took on his third term. He served as the president of Singapore for three terms from 2 January 1971 till his death in office on 12 May 1981. He was succeeded by Devan Nair on 23 October 1981.

Regarded as "the father of obstetrics and gynaecology in Singapore",^[2] Sheares was known for pioneering the lower Caesarian section in Singapore and creating an artificial vagina. The lower Caesarian section has since become the standard procedure in Singapore. Sheares remains the only president to have been elected for three terms and was the longest-serving president at 10 years – a record surpassed in January 2010 by S. R. Nathan who served 12 years. Both the Benjamin Sheares Bridge and Sheares Hall at the National University of Singapore are named after him.

Sheares was born on 12 August 1907 in the Straits Settlements (present-day Singapore) to an Eurasian family with an English lineage. He was the second of six children to his father Edwin Henry Sheares (1863–1940), an English technical supervisor of the Public Works Department, and his mother Lilian Jane Sheares (1880–1971; née Gómez), a Singapore-born woman of Chinese and Spanish descent.^[3][4][5]

Known affectionally as Ben or Bennie when he was younger, Sheares showed ambition to become a doctor – a dream deemed almost impossible for someone who was Asian and came from a poor family in the early colonial days of Singapore. However, his sister Alice encouraged him to follow his dream against his mother's wishes for her son to take up a job as a clerk and start helping out with the family bills as soon as he completed his Senior Cambridge Examinations (present-day GCE Ordinary Level).^[5]

Sheares was educated at Methodist Girls' School, when it was co-ed, and St. Andrew's School before transferring in 1922 to study at Raffles Institution, the only school equipped with scientific laboratories – making it an ideal place to further his ambition to become a doctor. In 1923, he enrolled into the King Edward VII College of Medicine (now the National University of Singapore) to begin his medical training.^[6][7] Sheares was aware that his family could not see him through the school fees afforded by the College, therefore he won a generous scholarship offered by the Council of the Medical College with his exemplary academic performance. With this scholarship, he was able to give $50 monthly to his mother for the support of his family.^[5]

Upon his graduation in March 1929, he served as an assistant medical doctor at Sepoy Lines General Hospital (present-day Singapore General Hospital) before specialising in and becoming an obstetrician at the Kandang Kerbau Hospital (KKH) in April 1931.^[8] Sheares was also the first local to become an obstetrician. By 1937, Sheares had become responsible for all obstetric patients at KKH.^[9] In 1940, Sheares was awarded the Queen's Fellowship which would have granted him a two-year postgraduate training in Britain. However, his studies were postponed due to the Second World War. During the war in 1941, whilst working at KKH, it was damaged by the bombing from the Japanese military and it was converted into an emergency general hospital for injured civilians. Later during the Japanese occupation, Sheares served as head of department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology and Medical Superintendent for the local patients section of the hospital.^[8][10][2]

After the war, Sheares was appointed as the Acting Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at the University of Malaya in Singapore (present-day National University of Singapore), which he held onto until May 1947 when he went to London for his postgraduate studies at London University to get a degree of Member of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (MRCOG) in January 1948.^[11] He had planned to take an examination at the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh to join the Fellowship of the Royal Colleges of Surgeons but returned back to Singapore after being called by then-Governor of Singapore Franklin Gimson to return to his post as Acting Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology as the previous Professor had retired.^[6][2]

Upon his arrival back to Singapore, he was appointed the Acting Professor and the job of Professor was advertised in the British Medical Journal. Sheares faced prejudice as despite serving as the Acting Professor for two years prior, the role of Professor was not given to him as he was a local and high-ranking colonials usually held such positions. He needed two referrals but neither his previous boss nor the Principal Medical Officer gave him references. Sheares eventually got his referrals from the Chairman of the Board of Examiners, who had previously examined him for his MRCOG, and the professor at Royal Postgraduate Medical School in Hammersmith.^[6][2] With these referrals, Sheares met with the Selection Board in London and, in January 1950, became the first local Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at the University of Malaya in Singapore.^[12][13] In December 1951, Sheares used the remainder of his Queen's Fellowship study to go to the United States for a year. During this period, he studied at different teaching institutions in the United States, such as Mayo Clinic.^[8][14]

Contributions by Sheares to obstetrics include the lower Caesarian section, which he pioneered, that resulted in a lower mortality and morbidity rate in pregnant women than the upper Caesarian section.^[9][2] Initially, very few Caesarian sections were carried out in Singapore and, when they were, used a differing method instead of the lower Caesarian. When Sheares became the head of department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology in the 1940s, he perfomed the first lower Caesarian section in Singapore which eventually became the standard routine in Singapore.^[6] Sheares also created a technique to make an artificial vagina for those born without one. This gained him worldwide recognition after he published the method in a 1960 paper titled Congenital Atresia of the Vagina: A New Technique for Tunnelling the Space Between Bladder and Rectum and Construction of the New Vagina.^[2][15]

From 1953 to 1955, Sheares helped design new additions to the KKH building such as the out-patient department and the front block of the hospital, stating that, "[KKH] was initially just a maternity hospital and I had to design the new buildings in such a way that the maternity operating theatres were in a different block from the gynaecological operating theatres."^[2] In 1955, Sheares became the first Singaporean to be awarded a fellowship by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, following his contributions to the sector.^[16] In 1959, Sheares advocated for voluntary sterilisation as a way to reduce population growth which he garnered criticism for. He later stated that he believed that his critics assumed he was advocating for forced sterilisation, when he was really advocating for voluntary sterilisation, further saying, "they also did not [sic] understand the consequences of letting the population grow un-checked."^[6] Sheares retired in June 1960 from the National University of Singapore as he was suffering from health complitcations such as gastric ulcers. He went into private practice and worked at a clinic at Battery Road. He had been serving as a Honorary Consultant at KKH after his retirement.^[6][17]

Following the death of incumbent president Yusof Ishak, six people – Yeoh Ghim Seng, Othman Wok, Wee Chong Jin, Ismail bin Abdul, Punch Coomaraswamy, and A. P. Rajah – were considered to be the most likely candidates for the role in November 1970.^[18] It was ultimately announced in December that Sheares would succeed Yusof and he became the second president of Singapore on 2 January 1971 after he was sworn in, following an unanimous agreement by Parliament.^[19][20]

His mother was 91 years old when she learnt that her son had become the president of Singapore. Just two weeks before she died, she said "God has blessed Bennie especially after the way he looked after us and me."^[5] During his first term in 1971, he was appointed Chancellor of the National University of Singapore and he served in that role till 1981.^[21][22][23] In 1974, Sheares was re-elected president by Parliament and served a second term. Whilst serving his second term as president, Sheares taught demonstration classes at KKH to gynaecologists.^[24] In 1975, Sheares was made an honorary fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine by John Stallworthy.^[25]

After his second term, Sheares had originally planned to retire as he felt that he did not have the energy for another term, but then-Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew persuaded him and Sheares, then aged 70, took on his third term as president in 1978.^[26][27] Sheares served as president until his death in office in 1981.^[28] Devan Nair succeeded him as president.^[29] According to a medical assistant of his, Sheares had possibly donated his entire salary as president to charity.^[30]

Sheares married Yeo Seh Geok Sheares (1917–2012), a trained midwife, in 1939 and they had three children together.^[31] Their daughter, Constance Sheares (born 1941), is an arts administrator, curator, and writer.^[32] In 1955, Sheares and his family were robbed in their bungalow, which was then provided by the University of Malaya in Singapore, and had S$10,000 worth of jewellery and cash stolen from them.^[33]

In November 1971, Sheares underwent medical treatment for a vascular disorder in the United States as the operation required had not yet been developed in Singapore.^[34] He returned back sometime in February 1972.^[35]

On 2 March 1981, it was found out that Sheares had lung cancer. On 3 May, Sheares briefly went unconscious whilst at home, it is suspected that he suffered from brainstem ischaemia which caused him to go unconscious.^[36] On 7 May, Sheares slipped into a coma after developing a cerebral haemorrhage.^[37] On 12 May, two nurses from the Ministry of Health and a security officer with oxygen cylinders and a stretcher were sent to his house. He died later that day at 2:10 pm.^[28] He was buried at Kranji State Cemetery.^[38]

Then-United States president Ronald Reagan stated that Sheares' had "an unselfish public devotion which all Americans admire." Then-Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia Sultan Ahmad Shah stated that he was "an illustrious son of Singapore who had contributed much to the existing close relationship between [the] two countries."^[39] Then-Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew said "his humble and unassuming manner belied an intense commitment to excellence".^[17]

Sheares is the first and only president to serve three terms and was also the longest-serving president at 10 years, before it was surpassed by S. R. Nathan in January 2010, who served for 12 years.^[40]

Locations in Singapore such as the Benjamin Sheares Bridge, Sheares Avenue, and Sheares Link are named after him.^[41][42] In academia, the student's residence Sheares Hall at the National University of Singapore,^[43] Benjamin Henry Sheares Professorship in Obstetrics & Gynaecology,^[44] Benjamin Sheares Professorship in Academic Medicine,^[45] and the Benjamin Sheares College at the Duke–NUS Graduate Medical School^[46] are all named after him.

•  Kedah Sultanate:
  • Knight Commander of the Order of the Crown of Kedah (1968)^[47]
•  United Kingdom:
  • Honorary Knight Grand Cross of The Most Honourable Order of the Bath (GCB) (1972)^[48][49]
•  Indonesia:
  • First Class of the Star of the Republic of Indonesia (1974)^[50]
•  Philippines:
  • Grand Collar of the Order of Sikatuna, Rank of Raja (GCS) (1976)^[51]

• President of Singapore
• Benjamin Sheares Bridge

• Media related to Benjamin Sheares at Wikimedia Commons