Dr. Yoshitaka Ogata died peacefully on November 19, 2015 at the age of 87.

He was a Seattle pioneer in many ways including in education and his professional life as an orthodontist. He will always be remembered as a humble, honest and hard-working man who put his family first.

Yosh was born September 12, 1928 in Kurume, Japan while his mother was on a family trip. He was the third of five children born to Charles Masato and Ine Ogata. He was their only child not born in America, which made getting into dental schools more challenging.

Yosh remembers growing up in Seattle during the Great Depression. His family owned a dry cleaners called “S and N” located on 6th Avenue between Jackson and King Streets. His dad would give him .25 cents for a haircut, but he’d go to the barber college and get a cut for only .15 cents and pool the rest of the money with friends to rent fishing boats and catch salmon in the Puget Sound. His love of fishing continued throughout his entire life.

When Yosh was 11 years old, his life changed dramatically after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. He could no longer move freely in Seattle and after Executive Order 9066, the Ogata family was forced to leave behind their possessions and could only take two pieces of luggage per person to the Minidoka Concentration Camp in Idaho via Puyallup. Yosh remembered friends asking if he did anything wrong or if he got a trial. The answer to both questions was “no.” During camp, he wrote music and played clarinet and saxophone on military radio.

After three years under barbed wire, armed guards and unbearable heat and cold, Yosh moved back to Seattle after the end of World War II. In 1947, Yosh graduated from Seattle’s Garfield High and also studied music at Cornish.

Yosh attended the University of Washington and majored in zoology with a minor in music. He always wanted to be a dentist since he was a little boy. A dentist at his church encouraged him after seeing Yosh’s talent at putting together model airplanes.

Because Yosh had been born in Japan and was not a U.S. citizen, no dental school would accept him. A reverend from Seattle’s Blaine Memorial Methodist Church wrote to Washington Senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson about Yosh’s plight.

Senator Jackson knew something needed to change, so he proposed two options.

One was to put Yosh’s name on a rider bill that was sure to be approved, thus allowing him to be granted citizenship by the U.S. Congress. The second option was to wait for the McCarran-Walter Act that would allow Asians citizenship for the first time through the naturalization process.

On April 13, 1953, Yosh became one of the first Asians to be naturalized under the new McCarran-Walter law. This milestone was covered by the media and has far-reaching effects to this day.

Now that Yosh was an American citizen, he was accepted into several dental schools. He graduated from University of Missouri at Kansas City’s (UMKC) dental school with Omicron Kappa Upsilon academic honors and then started his orthodontic program also at UMKC.

Yosh married his UW college sweetheart, Mabel Kondo, from Priest River, Idaho. They were married 62 years and Yosh never forgot how hard Mabel worked to support him through dental school.

After graduating with his Masters in Orthodontics, Yosh was drafted into the U.S. Army and stationed at Fort Richardson in Alaska. Yosh and Mabel enjoyed Alaska’s life of hunting, fishing and skiing. In fact, Yosh shot one of the world’s largest moose in Alaska and held a record in the Boone and Crockett’s record book for several years.

After his discharge from the Army, Yosh and Mabel moved back to Seattle and Yosh set up his practice at the 4th and Pike building, later moving into the Medical-Dental Building until he retired at the end of 2000. Yosh also taught at Seattle Children’s Hospital. He was a Diplomat of the American Board of Orthodontics, inducted into three honorary dental colleges and honored as Orthodontic Alumnus of the Year in 1990 by his alma mater UMKC. He also lectured numerous times throughout the U.S., Europe and Asia. He was a pioneer in how breathing and muscles affect the teeth and jaw.

Yosh and Mabel moved to Mercer Island 50 years ago and immersed themselves in their children’s Mercer Island activities and held season tickets to Husky, Seahawk and Mariner games.

Yosh is survived by his wife, Mabel, his four children and seven grandchildren. His oldest sons Greg (Siamphone Bounthaphone) and Randy (Wendy Alexander) followed in their Dad’s footsteps and are also orthodontists. His daughter, Julie (Gabriel Ciobanu), is a former KOMO-TV news anchor. His youngest son, Brett, is the head football coach and a math teacher at Mercer Island High School. His grandchildren include Austin, Carson and Kiana Ogata; Cienna and Carys Ciobanu; and Blake and Andrew Ogata.

A Celebration of Yosh’s Life will be held Saturday, December 5th at 1 pm at Blaine Memorial United Methodist Church.

In lieu of flowers, please kindly make donations in Yosh’s honor to Friends of Minidoka or Blaine Memorial United Methodist Church.