[3] During the "massive resistance" crisis, he attended Virginia Randolph Community High School in Glen Allen and graduated from that segregated institution as its most outstanding student in 1955.
He was active not only in his St. Paul's Baptist Church[6] and college alumni association (where he later served as secretary of the board of trustees), but also the Omega Psi Phi fraternity, the Salvation Army Boys Club and the North Richmond YMCA.
[7] Lambert also served on various boards of directors, including of the Sheltering Arms Hospital and the Central Virginia Health System Agency (treasurer)[8] and later Virginia Commonwealth University's Health Systems Authority Board, Dominion Resources (from 1994 until his death), Consolidated Bank & Trust Company, Student Loan Marketing Agency (Sallie Mae), USA Education Inc. and Benedictine College Preparatory and other schools.
[12] Lambert also helped expand the scope of services that fellow optometrists could provide, and worked to limit deleterious professional effects of retail interests.
Fellow democrat and lawyer Jean Wooden Cunningham succeeded him as the District 71 delegate in the session which began January 8, 1986, and would win re-election many times.
[15] The following year, Senator Lambert was defeated for re-election by former Delegate Donald A. McEachin, who made the Allen endorsement a key factor in the contest.
[17] He was survived by his widow, four community minded children (including Benjamin Lambert IV who continues the family's political involvement), and several grandchildren.