"Peace be with you Mary and your family. I remember the chocolate cake you sent with Sak when we were preparing to move Project Press to Hawaii. Did you know just before we left for Hawaii, he told me he had an uncle named Kapu and I would be welcome on any of his land. That's ok because I was a dumb haole, but I learned fast. May Sak rest in peace. Much Aloha, Ben"
In loving memory of
Yoshitaka Sakazaki
December 13, 1926 - March 16, 2014
Yoshitaka Sakazaki (nickname: "Sak") passed peacefully into heaven on Sunday, March 16, 2014, following his protracted farewell to our material world, caused by gradual physical and cognitive decline over the past decade and hastened by a long undetected tumor of the cecum. We will always remember him for his gentleness, kindness, and ability to "think big," forever looking beyond the details of everyday life.
Sak was born in the plantation town of Olaa on the Big Island of Hawaii, on December 13, 1926. He was one of eight siblings, all energetic boys, whose only run-in with the law was when a couple of adventurous brothers cajoled young Sak into joining them on a wild boar hunt that happened to trespass onto a fussy neighbor's property. One summer during high school, Sak worked harvesting sugar cane and found the "small fortune" he was earning so enticing that he told his father he wanted to quit school--whereupon his father exploded, angrily commanding Sak to continue pursuing his education.
After graduating from high school, Sak attended the University of Hawaii and served briefly in the U.S. Army. Following the end of World War II, he moved to the Bay Area in California, where he worked while taking classes at a local college. Thereafter, he transferred to UCLA, graduating a few years later with a bachelor's degree in engineering. During these early years in California, Sak met Mary, and the two were soon married.
To begin his career in civil service with the U.S. government, Sak settled in Ventura County, California, and worked at Pt. Mugu as an electronics engineer on various projects including missile guidance and fiber optics. During the 1950s and 1960s, when Sak and Mary were raising their three children in Oxnard, Sak became an award-winning Toastmasters public speaker and took up golf, tennis, aerobics, and jogging.
By the 1970s and 1980s, Sak's interest in business had blossomed, leading him to amass a sizable real estate investment portfolio and, along the way, complete his formal education with an M.B.A. degree from Pepperdine University. When not reading business books and magazines, he competed in long-distance races, including the Honolulu and New York City Marathons. In the summer of 1984, he carried the Olympic torch on one leg of its celebrated journey to the opening ceremony of the Los Angeles Summer Olympics.
During his retirement years, Sak continued to be absorbed in business pursuits and enjoyed participating in Bible study groups. In 2010, he and Mary moved from California to Bellevue, Washington. During the final year of his life, Sak resided in Overlake Terrace's Memory Care, where he was visited daily by his loving wife Mary. Until he could no longer converse, he often talked about going "across the water," presumably to a land of boundless opportunity and promise.
Sak was predeceased by his parents Ushikuro and Nami Sakazaki; his brothers Akiyoshi, Sunao, Mitsuo and Yoshinobu; and his son Melvin. He is survived by his brothers Sadayuki, Mamoru and Toshiyuki; wife Mary; daughter Denise; son Lloyd (wife Naoko); and grandchildren Dustin, Davis, Brody and Trey.
Tributes
"Our deepest sympathy. I have happy memories of Uncle Yoshitaka the times I did meet with him in California or Honolulu. Thank you for this posting, I've learned more than I knew before about his life. Sincerely, Jason Sakazaki (son of Sadayuki), my wife Teresa and sons Michael (18) and David (16)."
"We wish to express our condolences to the family. "