Kentaro Ikeda ’44

Ken died Nov. 6, 2011, in Larchmont, N. Y.

Ken’s father brought green tea to the United States while representing Japan at the 1904 St. Louis Expo. He then decided to educate his sons in the U.S. In 1938, Ken arrived at Lawrenceville and couldn’t speak or write English, which he soon learned in grammar classes.

At Princeton he roomed with John Dern-Palmer (the oldest member of ’44), majored in economics, and was in Key and Seal.

Except for the war, he would have returned to Japan. He left Princeton in 1943 to teach Japanese at Yale and continued to teach Japanese for years to State Department personnel, missionaries, and undergrads.

Ken became an importer of tea, started Kenta Ltd., and did packaging for several major brands. This work took him to Casablanca, Oran, Tangier, and Algiers.

He is survived by his wife, Yoko, a professional writer known as Young Yang Chung; and children Emi, Terumitsu, and Susan, who married Dick Eu’s son, Jeffrey; and two grandchildren. Ken and Dick Eu, ’44’s two Asian students, became lifelong friends. Both attended four major reunions together.