Eizo Sakamoto was a Disciples minister who served displaced Japanese and Japanese Americans in Colorado after World War II. 

Sakamoto was born in Kagoshima, Japan, on February 24, 1909. He immigrated to the United States in 1924 and graduated from the University of Redlands in California in 1941. He served as a student pastor in San Bernardino, California, from 1938 to 1942.  After Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, Sakamoto was relocated to the Santa Fe Internment Camp in March 1942. After his release in June 1942, he went to Colorado and worked on a friend’s farm. In September 1942, he began his studies at the Illif School of Theology in Denver and worked as a student pastor among the local Japanese and Japanese-American population. Upon graduating with a BD in 1945, he was ordained at Denver’s Central Christian Church. Also in 1945, he married Mary Sugioka; together they raised a daughter.

Shortly after his ordination, the United Christian Missionary Society (UCMS) sent Sakamoto to Rocky Ford, Colorado, to help Japanese and Japanese Americans in the Arkansas River Valley integrate into local churches. As a minister at the Rocky Ford Christian Church, Sakamoto conducted Japanese language worship services in Rocky Ford, Crowley, and Las Animas; he also worked with Japanese speakers in the San Luis Valley.

After the Immigration and Nationality Act became law in 1952, Sakamoto wrote a bilingual booklet in English and Japanese to guide Japanese people through the naturalization process. After receiving his American citizenship in 1953, he started teaching citizenship classes. In 1959, the Daughters of the American Revolution honored him with the first Americanism Medal for assisting nearly 100 Japanese earn American citizenship from 1953 to 1956. 

In 1958, Sakamoto was called to serve as minister to Manzanola Christian Church. Because many Japanese had left the Arkansas River Valley, UCMS ceased funding his missionary work in 1962. Sakamoto took a position as manager of the Rocky Ford Credit Union in 1963 and continued preaching and providing pastoral care as a bivocational minister. Health problems forced him to retire from his secular work in 1971. He served as an interim minister at Rocky Ford Christian Church from 1972 to 1975 and was appointed elder emeritus in 1983. Sakamoto died on July 4, 1984.

Source:

Eizo Sakamoto Biographical Reference File, Disciples of Christ Historical Society.
“Issei First to Get New DAR Pin.” Pacific Citizen. February 6, 1959. https://ddr.densho.org/ddr-pc-31-6/