Herbert John Sabel

1929 - 2022

Herbert John Sabel
February 27, 1929 - June 16, 2022
IN MEMORIAM: Herbert John Sabel lived the American dream to its fullest. Born in Chicago on February 27, 1929, he was the seventh of ten children. Upon graduating from high school in 1947, he joined the Army. Herb had the good fortune of being stationed in beautiful Monterey. It was then he decided he'd one day make California his permanent home. After being honorably discharged from the Army, Herb used the G.I. Bill to attend Indiana's Purdue University. In 1952, he received a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering. Immediately upon graduation Herb packed his bags and headed back to California, this time to stay.
By the mid 1950s, Herb had made a successful career in industrial machine sales. In the evenings he enjoyed learning folk dances and became an enthusiastic member of the Garfield Folk Dancers in Oakland. Summer weekends were spent on backpack trips with the Sierra Club. During winter he'd take to the ski slopes. In 1958 he was living in a large Oakland apartment building where he met another tenant, June Butters, an elementary school teacher. Within a few months Herb and June knew they were destined to be together. The couple would be wed a year later in Berkeley. Making their home in the Montclair district of Oakland, the couple would have three children, Mark, Jill and John.
Herb had a lifelong dream of starting his own business. In 1970 he decided it was time to realize that dream. With pencil and paper he had sketched a new packaging machine design of his own invention. Each evening, at their home in Oakland, Herb and June tucked their three young children into bed then cleared the kitchen table. This table served as Herb's workshop space. He sat at the table cutting and gluing little pieces of balsa wood to create a miniature model of his machine. That wooden model showed his unique machine design would work, and Herb applied for and received his first patent for this invention, a bottom loading case packer.
Herb used his sales skills, wooden model, and patent to persuade large companies to place orders for the real thing: custom machines, the size of a car, made of stainless steel. Herb and June formed Sabel Engineering Corporation based in Richmond to further design and manufacture the 'case packers.' As the company started to grow Herb and June chose to move their children and the company to Sonoma, the town the entire family had already come to love. In 1975 the Sabel Engineering plant was built on 8th Street East. Over the next three decades the company prospered, providing livelihoods for scores of Sonoma Valley families. Herb valued and cared deeply about the people who worked for him. Sabel Engineering employees and their families looked forward to the annual company events that included a picnic at Morton's Warm Springs and a Sabel Engineering Day at an Oakland A's game. In winter, as employees left work for the Christmas holiday, Herb would hand out fresh Willie Bird turkeys. Then at Easter, hams. Herb's machine designs would go on to earn him 12 U.S. patents. Over the years hundreds of specialized Sabel Engineering case packers were designed and assembled to handle everything from boxes of margarine to early Apple Macintosh computers. They were shipped to factories all over the world. Upon Herb's retirement at age 80, Sabel Engineering was sold to a firm in Minnesota.
Herb and June loved to travel together. They explored many countries, while on business trips and for pleasure, including exotic places like Libya. They particularly enjoyed viewing total solar eclipses which brought them to locations like Easter Island and Mongolia.
During the early 1990s the couple designed and built their dream home on the east side of town, on North Castle Road. The house and large yard were the perfect setting to host fundraisers for local nonprofit organizations, as well as the Sabel's annual Midsummer's Eve party which was always well attended by friends both new and old, even the folk dancers and Sierra Club members from decades before. The property also afforded Herb the opportunity to continue another of his hobbies, gardening. He particularly enjoyed growing unusual fruits like pluots and kiwis in addition to his beloved tomatoes. Whenever the grandchildren came for a visit, Grandpa Herb loved to help them pick and eat their own snacks: apples, carrots, oranges, grapes... whatever was ripe.
Several years ago June and Herb sold their North Castle home and moved to Cogir of Sonoma. The final years of Herb's life were marked by physical decline caused by Vascular Parkinsonism though he remained cheerful to the end. With his wife and daughter close by, Herb died on June 16, 2022, at age 93. He was survived by June, his wife of sixty-three years; son Mark of Anchorage, Alaska; daughter Jill Valavanis and husband Jim, their children Adrienne and Greg, all of El Verano; son John and wife Jennifer, their daughters Brisa and Elsie, all of Olympia, Washington; plus his two sisters.