Kent was born on February 21, 1953, the third of four children and the second son of Ben and Masako Hamada.  That same year, the Hamada family purchased a four-acre plot in Garden Grove on Harbor Blvd. to build a nursery in Orange County, naming it Garden City Nursery.  There, Kent spent the next nine years with his parents, three siblings, and occasionally, his Hamada cousins, running barefoot, wearing his Davey Crockett raccoon hat, building forts, making trouble and helping with the family business.

In 1962 the family relocated to the City of Orange when Cal Trans decided to plant the Garden Grove Freeway right through their front door and took control of the property.  Kent's family moved to an eight-and-a-half-acre orange orchard on Batavia St in Orange, where, in 1971 they opened Batavia Garden nursery.  During Kent's early years he attended various schools in Garden Grove and Orange, and graduated from Villa Park High School in 1971, where he lettered in wrestling.

Growing up, Kent had an active and happy childhood with a loving, if strict, father and a mother who doted on her children.  Living on a nursery away from school friends and with only his siblings for companions, Kent nonetheless always kept himself busy.  Besides, there was always his dad's shop.  Kent had a curious, quick and creative mind and through his father, Ben, learned the mechanical skills of working with all sorts of tools and equipment that served him for the rest of his life.

A lifelong aspect of Kent's personality was his ability to learn something quickly, getting good at it, and then moving on to the next challenge.  If it could be fixed, Kent could probably fix it.  If it was missing a part, Kent could find it or, amazingly, often make the missing part.

Kent had a wide range of other interests and liked living on the edge.  As kids, he and siblings, Keiko, Ron and Joanne, drove homemade go-carts and even had a dirt racetrack at the back of their Garden Grove property.  Kent always went fast and crashed often.  On family trips to the Colorado River, Kent water skied with abandon and gusto.  Popping high-speed wheelies on his motorcycle terrified his mother.

For two scorching summers beginning in 1969, Kent and Ron, then 16 and 18, joined their Okada cousins in Blythe, California, to harvest tomatoes in 110+ degree heat, living in a ramshackle motel.  It was a great shared experience with many memorable stories.

Along with his brother, Ron, and Okada cousins and friends, Kent liked drag racing and working on his car, a 1969 Ford Mustang "Mach One".  Later in life, he liked gambling in Las Vegas and, when he won big, indulged his hobbies with purchases of a ski boat, motorcycles, shotguns and golf clubs.

Kent graduated from Cal Poly Pomona in 1975 in Ornamental Horticulture, in keeping with his roots, both literally and figuratively, in the nursery business.  Ron always thought that Kent should have been an engineer because he had the kind of mind that knew how to solve mechanical problems in interesting and creative ways.  Kent really enjoyed college life, outside the classroom, with his cohort of friends.  Midnight runs to downtown LA for Tommy Burgers was a regular routine.

Kent got a job in San Diego, supervising a territory that stretched from Oceanside to the Mexican border, and bought a home in Oceanside.  Despite his fulltime and demanding job, Kent also got frequent calls from his mom to help at the nursery on the weekends, and, as a dutiful son, he could always be counted on to come home.

1981saw Kent embark on a great adventure by applying for a job in Saudi Arabia. He flew there on a cargo 747 Jumbo Jet chock full of 50 foot bare-rooted fan palms. He worked for Bechtel Corporation for two years, building greenhouses and growing and importing plants for the kingdom's massive King Khalid Airport project.   Kent lived in the American and British compound and had numerous, and hilarious, stories about circumventing inconvenient regulations.  Kent relished his required leaves of absence from the Kingdom, once on the Concorde SST, to see new countries and eventually went around the world three times.

As a young man, Kent's friends will remember someone who liked to have a good time attending the dances at La Coco, La Mirada Country Club and Parkview.  Another long-time group of friends enjoyed going to dinner regularly, celebrating birthdays and having barbeques. His last dinner with them was at Lawry's Restaurant in L.A., one of Kent's favorite places.  It was the Sunday before his passing.  Kent was a founding and active member of the Orange County Sansei Singles group and had many friends there.

Kent was also a loving and devoted son, brother and uncle.  As his father's health declined, Kent along with sister, Joanne, came home in 1983 to run the nursery and help their mom with their dad's care.  Brother Ron returned home to help, as well, in 1988, and the family cared for their father until Ben's death in 1992.  They ran Batavia Garden until earlier this year, with everyone looking forward to retirement.

Kent did not suffer fools and had definite opinions about everything, as his siblings and nephews will attest.  According to Kent, there was always "a right way" to do something and he shared those thoughts liberally with his brother-in-law Tom and sister Keiko's sons, Brian, Stephen and Kevin.  They have many "Uncle Kent-isms."  He taught them how to hold and use a shovel (yes, there is a right way to do it), run equipment, drive a manual shift truck, captain a boat, water plants, drive a tractor, use a skip loader, weld and use tools.  Kent was an important influence on them all.

And of course, Kent was the heart of the annual Hamada-Okada mochitsuki (mochi making) gathering each year, having inherited the mantel from his parents, uncles and aunts, a 65-year tradition.  Kent built much of the equipment that is used annually in the mochi production process.  No one knows who will fill Kent's important role now.  In so many ways he leaves a big hole in all of our lives.  We all agree with Kent's mother that he left us, "Too soon."

Private family services were held on Thursday, November 7 at Orange County Buddhist Church in Anaheim.

He is survived by his mother, Masako Hamada; siblings, Ellen (Thomas Crane) Hamada-Crane, Ronald and Joanne Hamada; nephews, Brian, Stephen, and Kevin Crane; he is also survived by other relatives.