UPDATE (adds memorial service) John Sachs, a former Westport resident who served on the Representative Town Meeting, died June 23 at Meadow Ridge in Redding. He was 93.
John Sachs: served on RTM. Contributed photo
While in Westport, he was active in the Westport Rotary Club (president 1989-1990), served on the board of Temple Israel, and was elected to four terms on the RTM, where he chaired the Employee Compensation Committee. He also worked on the fund raising effort for the Jerusalem International YMCA.
He was predeceased by his wife Eva in 1990. Born Hans Sachs on May 8, 1920, in Decin, Czechoslovakia, to Elsa and Otto Sachs, he was raised and educated in Vienna, Austria. He fled to Prague, Czechoslovakia in 1938 after the Nazi takeover of Austria.
He took the name John when he arrived at Ellis Island in 1940. As a member of the U.S. Army’s Tenth Mountain Division Ski Troops, he served as an Intelligence Staff Sergeant in the Aleutian Islands and in Italy.
He received multiple distinguished service awards, including the Bronze Star. He became a U.S. citizen in Leadville, Colo.
John and Eva were married in 1946. They built a life in Queens, N.Y. and then in Westport. He started his professional life in the textile field and then moved to the securities industry.
After moving to Westport in 1961, he founded The John Sachs Agency, an insurance agency that served clients throughout Fairfield County. He and Eva, a homemaker and artist, enjoyed skiing, traveling throughout the U.S., Canada, Europe, and Africa.
After his retirement in 1985, he counseled seniors in the complexities of Medicare; chaired the AARP State Legislative Committee; became a Big Brother mentoring an academically challenged middle school child in 2007; educated young students about the Holocaust whenever he had the opportunity; and translated German documents into English for others tracing their families’ fate in the Holocaust and for the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.
He is survived by his sons Tom (Sharin) of Alexandria, Va., and Gary (Jessica) of Maplewood, N.J, and three grandchildren –- Emily, David, and Eva.
He was buried in a private ceremony next to his wife Eva on June 25.
A memorial service will be held on Sunday, Aug. 11, at 2 p.m. at the Westport Woman’s Club, 44 Imperial Ave.
Contributions in his memory may be made to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.
The Harding Funeral Home in Westport is assisting the family with the arrangements.
