A tribute to the man who wrote about Long Beach for 50 years
Tim kept an old photo near his computer at work. A few middle-aged ladies are dressed in cardigans, pearls and party hats, and one of them is gripping the barrel of a liquor bottle like she’s talking with it. The camera caught her mid-word, and it probably wasn’t a nice one.
I finally asked, is that a relative? Your mom?
No, he said: He just found it on the ground and kept it. “There’s a lot going on in that photo,” he said. I looked closer.
Tim Grobaty, the city’s prolific columnist who made a living musing about his hometown and the people who made it interesting, is retiring. I gave it a few weeks — there were a few retirements this year — but I think he means it this time.
For those who don’t know, Tim has been writing about Long Beach for more than 50 years. He spent most of those years at the Press-Telegram writing his “What’s Hot?” column in the plural “we” voice, then continued on when we joined the Long Beach Post in 2018.
He started his career back when positions like “Music and Television Reviewer” existed at local papers. He wrote about shows, movies, music, local bands — a score of a job for a kid who never made it further than a few classes at Long Beach City College.
In those days, columnists were celebrities. They livened up the news pages with witty insight and sharp writing. They smoked in the office and sometimes woke up in the Press Club, a watering hole next to the old P-T edifice at Sixth Street and Pine Avenue.
Tim started as a lowly copy boy who filled glue pots and picked up lunch. When he achieved the terminal rank of “columnist,” no person or topic was off limits.
He goaded one former councilperson with relentless quips about how easy it was to run the suburban 5th Council District, Tim’s home for decades (“It’s harder to sleep in a hammock than it is to run the 5th;” the job is “as easy as pulling a wagon around”) and even launched a mock campaign for the seat.
Tim is an expert in music, history and filming; he knows a lot about architecture and real estate; he pretends to know a lot about marine biology. His primary fascination is people: The suburban vigilantes who once hunted coyotes with Zap Canes; the mass of picnicking Iowans (including his relatives) who moved here a century ago; the musicians who have come and gone through the decades; people like the unknown woman who once hurled an expletive, pearls be damned.
He loved most of his co-workers; he even taught one of the younger ones how to mail a letter. He was gracious in thanking his mentors, like the late Larry Allison — though he grumbled often about the many editors with bright ideas about what Tim should be doing with his time.
I became his “willowy” editor in 2011 when I joined the P-T. I was smart enough to leave Tim alone, an approach that got me in plenty of trouble.
The first time I had to defend one of his columns to the higher ups had this headline: “The day we confused Eloy Oakley with a cokehead.” (Oakley, the former president of Long Beach City College, was a very good sport, and later even gave Tim an honorary degree.)
Tim is sometimes boxed in as just a funny (or infuriating) prankster. That is not complete. He wrote about heavy stuff, like the death of his mother when he was an infant, with ease and restraint. He had a special way of allowing glimpses of pain; it was present, but not overwhelming.
You’re wrong if you think this is easy. Writing is hard. Tim did it every day in front of hundreds of thousands of anonymous readers, introducing us to his kids, Hannah and Ray, and his wife Jane. We got to know his dogs, including his chatty Australian shepherd Jimmy.
The day after Jimmy died, a lady came by the office and presented Tim with a small sculpture of a dog perched on a lifeguard station. Truth in all its forms has a way of making us feel less alone.
Among his greatest sorrows was what became of the news business in the latter half of his career, which he chronicled in a book called “I’m Dyin’ Here.” He started his career at a time when newspapers struggled to spend all their money; he ended it at a nonprofit that has to budget to the dime for office supplies.
By the end of our time at the more than century-old P-T, only four of us remained. Tim was ready to retire. I was updating my resume.
We were sitting in the office one day, “spiraling into despondency over the state of the paper,” as he wrote, brainstorming who might come to the rescue. The two of us landed on John Molina, a local investor and longtime fan of Tim’s columns. An hour later — and this is true — John called Tim and said he wanted to buy the paper.
John didn’t buy the paper; he bought the Post, giving Long Beach another 10 years with Tim.
In December 2023, we relaunched on our own as a nonprofit, and I learned another thing that is not easy: Running a financially sound news organization. It was brutal; Tim isn’t one for pep talks, but his presence reminded me, always, of why local journalism matters: Without it, we would never know each other.
Tim doesn’t want a retirement party, which is fine because organizing parties isn’t my thing. But it doesn’t feel right to send him off with only the reflections of one editor over the span of such an impactful career.
Your assignment (yes, you) comes with a few options, and one opportunity for extra credit:
- Send me links to your favorite Tim Grobaty columns, and tell me why.
- Send me your stories about Long Beach, growing up here, the people here, or anything personally meaningful to you about Long Beach and how this city has impacted you.
EXTRA CREDIT: Give me ideas about how we — “we” in the plural — can somehow use our platform at the Post to carry on Tim’s brand of honesty, wit and humor. Long Beach is a special place; let’s keep telling that story.