Born in 1942, Dennis grew up in the shadow of downtown Los Angeles. His father, a Chinese immigrant and his mother a Japanese-American born in Tacoma, WA started a brood of 5 children, Dennis being the middle child. Growing up in a time when there were no computers, electronic games, iPhones, iPads, ipods, skateboards or any of the play toys that today’s kids have at their fingertips, he rode his bike or handmade scooter (remember old skates on wooden orange crates?) everywhere and enjoyed the sanctuary of the city parks, playing cops and robbers and hide and seek with the neighborhood kids. That’s what they did back in the day. Today he is a resident of Torrance, a 23 year retiree, a husband (Sharon), father (Ray, Rick and Ryan) and a grandfather of five great kids (T.J., Sean, Kimani, Evan and Kianna), living a healthy, fruitful and enjoyable life that includes family, traveling, camping and snow skiing. (And of course softball)

His first taste of team sports came when he and his friends joined a local park baseball team sponsored by a furniture store. What a rag tag bunch of kids…..just like the “Little Rascals” or “Our Gang” kids that had fun just messing around and getting into all kinds of mischief (he would probably be Spanky or Mugs McGinnis). His growing love of baseball saw him play at Manual Arts High School in Los Angeles and after graduating in 1960, on the US Army’s, Hawaii Division Special Duty Baseball team that competed against other military agencies. This enabled him to visit and play on most of the Hawaiian Islands during his 3-year military requirement, which started his ongoing love affair with the islands and is mostly the reason for the colorful Hawaiian print shorts he is known to wear while playing softball.

While stationed on Oahu, at Schofield Barracks the Headquarters for the 25th Infantry Division, he was placed in the U.S. Army Hawaii) Military Police Division and became a MP. (Leave it to the Army, he was schooled and trained as an admin assistant). This is what’s known in the service as a SNAFU (being put in a job one knew nothing about after being trained for another specific job.). So with on-the-job training he became a military policeman on the most beautiful place on earth spending time either on base or at Fort DeRussy. Fort DeRussy is a United States military reservation in the Waikiki Beach area of Honolulu. The installation consists mainly of landscaped green space and a recreational beach for military personnel What a job, waving cars onto the base at Schofield Barracks and/or roaming the beach in swim trunks on Waikiki making sure G.I.’s, Jarheads and Swabbies didn’t get too rambunctious. (It was a tough job but somebody had to do it)

During his time in the US Army which encompassed the Eisenhower and Kennedy Administrations, he also was sent on Temporary Duty to places like South Korea, Japan, India, Burma, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Hong Kong, Singapore and Indonesia, while stopping in places like Guam,, Wake Island and the Philippines, simply because he was an MP who was Asian and could pass as a citizen of these particular countries. His main job was to wear a .45 cal. pistol and have a general’s briefcase handcuffed to his wrist. (Another tough job). Meanwhile there was fighting going on then in South East Asia even though officially not until 1965 when Vietnam was deemed a “Conflict”.

After finishing his military career in 1960 he finally was able to use his military admin training and became a Policy Typist for a large Title Insurance Company in Los Angeles. This led him to a 37 year career in the Title Insurance business which covered Policy Typist, Tax Searcher, Property Searcher, Court Searcher, Supervisor -Searching Department, Assistant Vice President-Searching Department, Senior Vice President-Searching Department, Regional Vice President – Vendor Management Services, and best of all player/manager for the First American Title Company of Los Angeles (FATCOLA) Softball Team.

Yes, that FATCOLA; and this will explain why you see that name on many softball jerseys. The company sponsored softball team Dennis managed and played for that has been known throughout the softball world since 1972. His first team was a 16 inch team playing in the old West Coast 16 Inch Softball League comprised of players from other teams already established in that league. Most players came from the Tappa Keggas and a few from Dependable Trophy. You old-timers will remember the other teams in that Big Ball League being the Gardena Jokers, Salty Dogs, San Pedro Islanders, Long Beach Lamp Lighters, The Rack, Wild Mustangs and the L.A. Old Timers. FATCOLA went on to regular 12 inch softball in the Insurance leagues then expanded to various city leagues first in Los Angeles then throughout the South Bay, playing in all the softball organizations such as ASA, SCSA, USSSA and leading up to all the Senior Softball Organizations that exist today.

Dennis’ FATCOLA teams have played in championship tournaments in most states in the country. To this day, no matter where Dennis might be, someone will approach him and say “I played against you, do you remember me”? Of course in most cases the face is unfamiliar, so many games, so many different ball fields and so many teams through the years, one can’t remember everyone. However, there are memories that will last forever and friendships that will never die all thanks to playing softball. Since 1972 there have been hundreds of individuals that have played for a FATCOLA softball team. For many of us, we thought playing up to 40 years of age was going to be about it, but with the emergence of Senior Softball we now look to our 80’s and hope to still be active and playing. Currently, Dennis still manages or plays in the Long Beach, Culver City and of course the Manhattan Beach Senior Softball Association and is a MBSSA League Director and the day to day Coordinator responsible for it’s daily operation. He’s now looking forward to whatever comes next.