[1][2][3][4][5][6] Zacha studied architecture at the University of California, Berkeley, spent four years in the United States Navy entertaining troops as a writer and actor during World War II, and later made unsuccessful forays into the priesthood and drama.
Returning to Berkeley to continue his architecture studies, he supported himself as a cable car conductor, but dropped out after injuring his right hand in a fall.
[7] While in Texas in 1953 for a Houston exhibit of paintings he had made in Italy, he met his future wife Jennie Malone, a fashion designer.
Zacha's friendship with Yoshida became the basis for a sister city relationship between Mendocino and Miasa, formalized in 1980.
[4][9][11][12] Zacha's series of 55 serigraphs depicting the Tōkaidō road in Japan is collected in his book Tokaido Journey (1985).