Lee Raymond Sachs

Lee Raymond Sachs was born to Edwin Richard and Jeanne Mary (Burke) Sachs on December 27th, 1942. He grew up like most boys – playing ball, learning to swim, hanging out with friends. He liked school and was a better than average student although he struggled with math. His first job was at age 15 when, after a lot of begging, his parents allowed him to ride his bike to a nearby country club where he caddied for some of Chicago’s elite. He loved the game and played himself for many years. Hockey, basketball and swimming were also among his favorite sports. Eventually racket ball and biking replaced the first two but swimming remained a favorite that served him well into later life.

Lee began working for Jewel/Osco when he was 17. During his college years he worked part-time to supplement his tuition. He loved to write and professors told him he could have a career as an author or in the classroom, if he chose. Instead, after graduating from DePaul University in 1964, Lee opted to pursue full time employment with Jewel/Osco. He earned his first store, #6221, only four years later at the age of 26, the youngest store manager ever promoted to that position in the history of the company. It was a small store, but a good beginning for an ambitious enterprising young man with a growing family. He and Virginia (Bullat) had married shortly after college graduation and had welcomed their first son, Daniel, two years before Lee’s promotion. Over the next ten years, as Lee climbed the ladder professionally, they welcomed four additional sons and a daughter to their family – Michael, Christopher, Timothy, Scott and Heather.

On a Saturday morning, after a game of racket ball in 1980, at the age of 38, Lee suffered a heart attack. His daughter, Heather, was just a year old at the time. He made the life changing decision that day to stop smoking and quit “cold turkey” from a 3-pack-a-day habit. Two years later he had a quadruple bypass and became an avid biker seeking opportunities to participate in rallies across the tristate area. He accepted the opportunity to exchange a store management role for corporate responsibilities hoping for shorter hours and a less stressful lifestyle enabling him to spend more time with family and friends. To supplement the income lost due to leaving the “store management track”, Lee became an adjunct professor at Roosevelt University over the next several years teaching students interested in joining the hospitality industry.

Family was always at the center of Lee’s world. He was a devoted family man often starting work at 3 or 4AM so he could be home to coach the neighborhood Little League team. He made every effort to spend time with his children as is evidenced by the multitude of photographs of family outings and vacations. He loved watching as they grew up – although he complained about torn screens, removed doorknobs, stopped-up toilets and peony bushes defrocked of their blooms by a baseball bat in the name of “practice.” Unfortunately the relationship between Lee and Virginia did not pass the test of time. None the less, Lee continued to be actively involved in the lives of his children and worked hard to be on hand for games, graduations, proms, plays, weddings – any important event in their lives.

Lee met his second wife, Caron, in February 1996 at building “G”, the after-hours hangout for Jewel/Osco employees. Their relationship grew over the next several years and they married in Hawaii in 2001. They cruised the Caribbean, vacationed in Italy and traveled to the east coast and to the southwest several times. Gatlinburg, TN – just a short three hour drive from Cincinnati, OH where Caron has friends and family – become a favorite long weekend getaway for the couple. Wherever their travels took them, Lee and Caron visited every zoo in their path at least once because Lee had a love of everything wild – particularly tigers. They took ballroom dance lessons, were theater season ticket holders in both Chicago and Phoenix and were known to dress-up in medieval garb to visit King Richard’s Faire (Chicago) or the Renaissance Festival (Phoenix) each season. Lee preferred to attend ball games rather than watch them on television; however, he made an exception if the Chicago Bulls or Bears were playing. Regardless whether they won or lost, he was a staunch supporter. He also rarely missed watching a golf tournament in which Tiger Woods competed.

Over time arthritis set in and Lee required multiple joint replacements and two back fusions. When he started having trouble getting through airport security, he was affectionately dubbed the “Bionic Man” by family members. Yet every morning, without fail, he got up and exercised to loosen his stiff joints. Lee worked to stay as mobile as possible. His mantra was “The more I do, the more I can do.” He tried hard not to let anything slow him down for long, if at all.

Retirement came in April 2004 after a career within the Jewel/Osco organization that spanned more than four decades. He had risen through the ranks from stock boy to store manager several times over, culminating in the position of Corporate Training Manager for the Midwest Division. In the store environment, Lee used his natural people skills to win over the most complaining of customers and to communicate effectively with team members at all levels. Later in the corporate offices he taught those same skills to other supervisors and junior managers in a classroom environment through team building and role playing exercises.

He was responsible for the preparation of Training Manuals used in every department of the stores – from the proper procedure for cleaning a meat slicing machine, how to bag groceries properly (in paper, back then) and how to work effectively with other team members. There seemed to be no end to the procedures that needed to be committed to paper or the classes that needed to be developed and taught and Jewel/Osco turned to Lee and his team to get the job done.

Over the years, Lee wrote motivational programs to train newly promoted junior managers as well as senior staff. Depending on the projects in progress at any given time, he supervised a training staff and developed programs to hone their personal training skills as well, known as “Train the Trainer” programs.

But he was most proud of the role he could play and the privilege he had to personally mentor trainees as they rose in the company just as he had done years before. He thought it was ironic that his college professors had thought he would be a good instructor. At age 21, he had dismissed the idea, yet as fate would have it, he devoted many years to doing exactly that.

Everyone seemed to know Lee. He could not walk into a store without being spoken to by others – employees and customers alike. Even delivery personnel from outside vendors knew him from his years in the stores. Lee truly enjoyed people and he found it rewarding to know that many remembered him and that his efforts had been appreciated.

In 2005, a year after his retirement, Lee and Caron began construction of their dream home in Arizona. It had been a long-time dream of Lee’s to retire somewhere with “no stress, no snow and no stairs.” He framed his snow shovel and gave it a prominent place on the wall in the garage of his new single level home a year later. The house also had two other amenities important to Lee – a large kitchen where he could “play with food” and a pool where he could maintain his daily exercise regimen. The Arizona heat was good for his arthritis and, other than to visit, he never expressed a desire to return to Chicago. Many of his buddies from Jewel/Osco either have homes in the Phoenix area or visited during the winter months. There was always someone to go to lunch with to “shoot the breeze” or to talk about the “good old days.” Family members visited occasionally as well and he felt retirement was good.

Lee was blessed to welcome his first grandchild, a boy, Liam Robert in April, 2005. Liam was followed by two lovely granddaughters, Katrina Virginia (2009) and Natasha Patricia (2011). It became increasingly difficult for Lee to travel, so while he didn’t have an opportunity to see them as often as he would have liked, he doted on each of them from afar.

Friends and family will remember Lee as a gentleman and a gentle man who always wore a smile on his face and had kind words for everyone. He was a mentor to many and a good friend to even more during his 75 years on this earth. He is sorely missed.

“In the end, it isn’t the years in your life that count, it’s the life in your years…” – Abraham Lincoln

Lee is survived by his devoted wife and best friend of 22 years, Caron Woolman Sachs, his loving sons Daniel and his wife Lynn Randazzo of Des Plaines, IL, Michael and his wife Anne Justkowski of Des Plaines, IL, Christopher and his wife Michelle Starbuck of Marango, IL, Timothy and his wife Karen Mack of Brookfield, IL, and Scott Sachs of Skokie, IL, and his beautiful daughter Heather Remillard and her husband Roger of Skokie, IL. Lee was the proud grandfather of his three precious grandchildren Liam, Katrina and Natasha. He is also survived by his sister and lifetime friend Linda Sachs Bauer of Hardeeville, SC.

Lee was preceded in death by his father, Edwin Richard Sachs (1918-1996), his mother, Jeanne Mary (Burke) Sachs (1919-2011) and by his first wife Virginia Bullat Sachs (1944-1997).

A celebration of Lee's life will take place on Saturday, May 26, 2018 from 11 AM until 4 PM in the Hearth Room of the Arlington Lakes Golf Club, 1211 S. New Wilke Road, Arlington Heights, IL. Please come and share your memories.

In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to the American Heart Association, the American Diabetes Association, St Jude Children’s Research Hospital or the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA). Each is a worthy organization that Lee and Caron have proudly supported for years.