Stanley Rakoff DDS

1928 - 2010
Dr. Stanley Rakoff, 82, died on October 24, 2010 in Palo Alto, California. He was born in Manhatten on October 14, 1928.

Dr. Rakoff was a brilliant student with a near-photographic memory. He graduated from Seward Park High School in 1942 at the age of 14, and the City College of New York in 1946 at the age of 18. He went on to receive a DDS from New York University.

In his youth he performed comedy routines in Manhatten and the Catskills. He was actively involved in the settlement houses of lower Manhatten and their affiliated summer camps. While working as a counselor at Camp Henry in 1944 he met his future wife Phyllis.

Dr. Rakoff served as a captain in the US Air Force during the Korean War from 1953-1955.

For over 40 years Dr. Rakoff practiced dentistry first in Manhatten, then in Blauvelt, New York, where he and his family had moved in 1958. For many years he was attending dentist at Nyack Hospital in Nyack, New York and school dentist for the Orangetown School District.

In 1998 Dr. and Mrs Rakoff retired and moved to California. He loved playing golf, acting in community theater productions, and traveling up and down the west coast of California and Canada, but the most important thing in his life was his family.

Dr. Rakoff is predeceased by his children Mark and Anita. He is survived by his wife of 59 years, Phyllis, his daughters, Amy Rakoff and Joanna Smith Rakoff, his brother Saul Rakoff MD, his sons-in-law David Rosenblum and Evan Smith Rakoff, and his grandchildren Jessica, Ben, and Jason Rosenblum and Coleman and Rebecca Pearl Smith Rakoff.

Dr. Rakoff was dearly loved by his family and will be missed by all who knew him. Services will be private.