Celebrate the life of Dr. George Tanbara, Tacoma’s ‘24-7 doctor’

Time has shown that fund raising and filling seats was always easier with the name of Dr. George Tanbara attached to it.

‘The only problem was, everybody wanted to get up and say how much they love George and (his late wife) Kimi,” said David Flentge, a longtime friend and CEO of Community Health Care, an organization Tanbara helped start.

That kind of behavior will be expected Aug. 5 when a celebration of life will be held at 2 p.m. for the former “24-7 doctor” and prolific volunteer, who died July 1.

Who knows, maybe all 119,00 square feet of the Greater Tacoma Convention Center will be filled with Tanbara’s admirers, family and friends — he had 95 years of changing people’s lives under his belt.

This story was originally published July 19, 2017 at 9:26 PM with the headline "Celebrate the life of Dr. George Tanbara, Tacoma’s ‘24-7 doctor’."