- Title
- A celebration of Bill Soberanes on his 100th birthday
-
-
- Creation Date (Original)
- October 19, 2021
-
-
- Description
- Bill Soberanes, also known as Mr. Petaluma, was best known for his 49 years at the Petaluma Argus-Courier but also as the founder of the World Wrist-wrestling Contest, the Ugly Dog Contest, the Houdini Halloween Seance. A self-described peopleologist, he claimed to have collected over 45000 photos of himself with presidents, sport figures, movie stars, politicians, celebrities, gangsters and ordinary people too. He was one of the great characters in the history of Petaluma. Jim and Tom welcome Katie Watts, Chris Samson, Harlan Osborne, Chris Linnell and John Sheehy to tell Bill stories celebrate his legacy on the night of his 100th birthday.
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-
- Item Format or Genre
- ["interviews","documentary film","streaming video"]
-
- Language
- ["English"]
-
- Local History and Culture Theme
- ["Prominent Sonoma County Residents"]
-
- Subject (Person)
- ["Soberanes, Bill, 1921-2003"]
-
- Digital Collection Name(s)
- ["Sonoma County Stories -- Voices From Where We Live"]
-
- Digital Collections Identifier
- cstr_vid_000331
-
-
A celebration of Bill Soberanes on his 100th birthday
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00:00
[Music]
00:07
on stage
00:10
[Applause]
00:10
[Music]
00:26
tonight Tom and I are back for a special
00:28
episode to celebrate the man known as
00:30
Bill Soberanes on his 100th birthday with
00:33
a group of people who loved him dearly
00:35
we gather tonight in the heart of
00:36
downtown Petaluma to talk about the man
00:38
that they called Mr Petaluma he was best
00:40
known for his 49 years of the Petaluma
00:42
Argus Courier but also as the founder of
00:44
the Wrist Wrestling Contest, the Ugly Dog
00:46
Contest the Harry Houdini Halloween
00:48
Seance and so much more
00:50
he was a self-described peopleologist
00:53
and claimed to have collected over 45
00:55
000 photos of himself with president
00:57
sports figures movie stars politicians
00:59
and ordinary people too he was one of
01:01
the great characters in history of
01:02
Petaluma and we are thrilled to be
01:04
joined tonight by our friends Katie
01:05
Watts, Chris Sampson, Harlan Osborne, Chris
01:08
Linnell and John Sheehy to tell Bill's
01:10
stories and to celebrate his legacy so
01:12
let's do it welcome to the program
01:13
everybody thank you so much welcome nice
01:15
to be here
01:16
tom gaffey
01:18
jim
01:19
why does Bill sabrana strike you as such
01:22
an important Petaluma figure
01:24
well
01:25
boy why is he such because for me he was
01:27
Petaluma uh uh he was
01:30
really the first time I had been
01:32
welcomed to Petaluma and it was by Bill
01:33
soberanis uh I was about five years old
01:36
and my dad and I were maybe I was in
01:39
downtown Petaluma for the first time
01:40
ever
01:41
my dad and I were on fourth street
01:43
looking in the window of the little pet
01:44
shop that was down there and chris came
01:47
along chris
01:48
now we're we're stuck anyway
01:51
uh you know and he reminds me so much
01:53
compliment but Bill came along and and
01:55
uh met us at the market and my dad
01:57
introduced me to Bill and the very next
01:59
day I ended up in his uh article
02:03
tommy gaffey's first day in downtown
02:04
Petaluma and uh from that point on i
02:07
felt like I owned a piece of Petaluma i
02:09
felt like I had been uh invited in and
02:13
just one meeting with Bill not to
02:15
mention the fact that what a guy um i'd
02:18
never seen anybody like him i'd never
02:21
spoken to anybody like him
02:23
you had to learn Bill speak in order to
02:25
have a conversation with him really you
02:27
could have some perfunctory meetings and
02:29
conversations with him but did you
02:31
really understand what he was saying
02:34
you needed to learn the lean in you
02:36
needed to slow down what you were
02:38
hearing in your ears to understand what
02:41
he was rapid firing to you
02:44
and once you got that Bill was just like
02:47
this encyclopedia of stories
02:50
when I was a kid working behind the
02:51
candy counter here at the theater was a
02:53
showcase theater in those days he would
02:55
uh many sundays he would find his way
02:58
towards the
02:59
late afternoon
03:00
into our lobby and he and I would sit in
03:03
the lobby we'd be leaning on the counter
03:05
and I had to learn how to lean in to
03:07
understand what he was talking about and
03:09
he would tell me the most incredible
03:11
stories about this town
03:13
and uh
03:14
he was the first one to tell me about
03:16
keller he was the first one to tell me
03:18
about uh charlie garzoli he was the one
03:21
that told me just all of the great
03:22
Petaluma stories
03:24
and he for me and I think a lot of
03:27
people
03:28
was our introduction
03:30
and our welcome to this town
03:32
and it's uh when you could understand
03:34
Bill speak you knew you were a
03:35
pettilumin
03:37
that I think is what part of the uh but
03:40
everybody's got a different reason for
03:41
loving and and uh uh Bill adventures
03:46
let's go anybody want to jump in what
03:48
did that jog why did we love him
03:51
i moved to Petaluma on may 1st 1981 and
03:54
on may 3rd 1981 I called the argus
03:57
courier because my parents had told me
03:59
that when you move to a new town you
04:01
always subscribe to the paper so that
04:03
you will become a part of the town
04:05
faster
04:06
and the argus was delivered the first
04:08
day and I read a copy of Bill's column
04:11
and I cut it out and I mailed it to my
04:13
best friend in san francisco and I said
04:15
can you believe that the local paper is
04:18
printing something like this if I ever
04:21
worked for that paper I would edit this
04:25
in 1994 I went to work could we pause
04:28
what was it that was so silly to you um
04:30
it didn't make any sense it
04:33
it was it was illogical it was rambling
04:36
it was just crazy and I didn't
04:40
understand
04:41
i could come from san francisco the land
04:43
of herb kane
04:45
and who was this guy
04:48
so in 1994 I went to work for the argus
04:51
courier and I didn't know very much
04:53
about journalism I have a degree in
04:55
drama
04:56
and uh one of the first things that i
04:58
was told was that I would check out
05:00
Bill's column and I thought oh good
05:03
now's my chance and I learned
05:05
immediately that you couldn't edit Bill
05:08
because then he wouldn't be Bill
05:11
and Bill was precious
05:14
even though his writing style was not
05:17
herb kane even though his writing style
05:20
was sometimes very strange it was Bill
05:23
and he belonged to this town and this
05:25
town belonged to him
05:29
we have chris linnell at the table who
05:30
does a good impersonation you ready to
05:32
call him many times over the years
05:35
you want to you want to do a little Bill
05:37
uh like a column like could you just
05:39
like oh well you know if you can talk
05:40
about doing a column you know you talk
05:42
about the one that I was first in 1981 i
05:44
had the same experience that tom gaffy
05:46
did
05:47
i
05:47
moved to pedro was this chris or is this
05:49
bill
05:50
all right
05:55
i thought I got to get in that column
05:57
somehow and uh so i'm down on the corner
05:59
of washington and the boulevard and
06:01
and there he is
06:02
you know puffing his pipe with his
06:04
newspapers and his bag over his shoulder
06:06
and he's ambulant down and he's standing
06:08
there at the crosswalk waiting to cross
06:10
the street and I came up to him and i
06:12
said I was 18 years old and I said
06:14
mr soberanes I said i'm
06:17
chris linnell I you know i'm an
06:18
entertainer I i I i'm a puppeteer I have
06:21
a performance crystal the clown
06:23
he's all right here remember write your
06:25
name down and i'll i'll write about you
06:26
my column so sure enough there was you
06:29
know the next column that you and I i
06:31
felt just as tom did I felt as though
06:33
you know I was already a part of this
06:35
town I was so excited it was it was most
06:37
exciting i'd been in the paper before
06:39
where I grew up but nothing was like
06:41
this this was different
06:42
and um
06:43
i said I i used to see him a lot i
06:45
worked at ktob
06:47
for four years in the 70s and early 80s
06:50
and
06:51
you know he would come in to talk to
06:52
devoto and
06:53
lipman and you know about wrist
06:55
wrestling and so forth and so i'd see
06:56
him a lot
06:57
but I was at the argus courier office
06:59
one day talking to martin brody who was
07:00
the managing editor at that time he's a
07:02
friend of mine and I was standing across
07:04
the counter and
07:05
the office staff were all there they
07:06
were all listening and you know and i
07:07
was doing Bill I was talking about and
07:09
martin was laughing everybody was
07:11
laughing and then all of a sudden martin
07:12
started going like this
07:17
and I turn around and Bill comes walking
07:18
in the door and he comes over and he
07:19
says what the hell are you trying to do
07:21
take my goddamn job
07:26
but after that he recognized certainly
07:28
after the tribute dinner uh that they
07:31
had for him uh what was that 89 88 88
07:35
uh I i showed up you know dressed as
07:38
Bill and he recognized uh
07:41
it was increasing his celebrity that uh
07:44
you know it made him a more legitimate
07:45
star it drew more attention and I think
07:48
he finally felt he was getting some
07:49
respect I i he loved it and after that
07:52
i'd call him up and i'd say Bill uh
07:54
you know they want me to be Bill at this
07:55
thing you want to come with oh yeah yeah
07:57
sure so i'd say all right just wear
08:00
black pants and a white uh dress shirt
08:02
and uh and i'll bring everything else
08:04
and then I had two uh I had this plaid
08:06
sport coat I found two identical sport
08:07
coats at the thrift shop
08:10
i had several different outfits put
08:11
together and so i'd go over to the house
08:13
and uh you know i'd dress him up and we
08:15
were costumed identically and I had a
08:18
you know name tag on that said Bill
08:19
sobranus and he had a name tag on and
08:21
said chris lynell said Bill sabrana's
08:23
peopleologist and he said chris linnell
08:25
impersonator
08:26
and we go to these events you know and
08:27
his old buddies uh you know the uh i
08:30
don't know art parent and uh
08:33
thomasini and you know all the guys that
08:35
knew him the the
08:36
clover guys and they come up and they oh
08:38
hey Bill bill here have a drink Bill hey
08:41
Bill uh geez you sound more like Bill
08:43
than he does you know like which one he
08:44
was Bill and it was Bill loved it he
08:46
just loved it I love it speaking of the
08:48
argus uh you uh
08:50
were the managing editor chris sampson
08:52
what did you think of Bill uh of uh Bill
08:54
Soberanes when you started at the argus
08:56
well I started at the argus in 1975
08:59
and uh
09:01
as uh
09:02
katie and and uh
09:04
chris as Bill
09:06
uh were saying uh
09:08
my first impression was uh you know who
09:11
is this guy I mean he he came into the
09:13
office every day he wrote his column
09:15
from home
09:16
and he would bring it in types and in
09:18
those days um you know we didn't have
09:19
computers we just we had typewriters but
09:22
Bill did not have an office at the argus
09:24
he had
09:26
a filed drawer in this bank of file
09:28
cabinets and so he would come in you'd
09:30
check his mail because his mail would be
09:31
thrown in there
09:32
and this guy
09:34
as uh tom was saying earlier you had to
09:38
took you a while to understand uh
09:41
Bill uh
09:42
Bill speak
09:43
and uh he always had a pipe and uh
09:46
sometimes the uh he would forget that it
09:48
was lighted and he would send ashes
09:50
flying around
09:51
and
09:52
but
09:53
so my first impression was you know he's
09:55
kind of a
09:56
odd duck katie watts recently wrote an
09:59
article uh who was Bill Soberanes and why
10:01
did he mean so much metalluma and the
10:03
third paragraph says in 1997 a new
10:06
publisher from out of the area he called
10:08
one of the employees the features editor
10:09
into the office and he had a question
10:11
who is this guy
10:12
and how soon can we get rid of him
10:14
that's right it was 1997 this publisher
10:18
had just come to Petaluma and uh he
10:21
didn't get Bill at all
10:23
and he called diane rieber who was a
10:26
feature setter at the time he called
10:27
diane and me into his office and it said
10:29
exactly what you said you know who is
10:31
this guy and how soon can you get rid of
10:32
him we were horrified we said you know
10:34
Bill's a part of Petaluma he's beloved
10:36
he's written this column for umpteen
10:38
years you know you can't fire him but
10:40
there would be an uprising and lots of
10:42
uh cancellations of subscription so
10:45
uh Bill carried on there was another
10:46
incident in 1979 a woman named lucy
10:50
somebody wrote a letter to the editor
10:53
uh criticizing Bill and saying you know
10:55
this is like an affront to journalism
10:58
you know how can this guy be writing a
10:59
column and the outpouring of letters in
11:02
support I mean it filled the
11:05
letters to the editor page for several
11:07
days and the argus actually wrote a nice
11:09
editorial uh supporting uh Bill and
11:12
saying how important he was to Petaluma
11:14
so yeah Bill wrote a column for 49 years
11:16
never missed a deadline but he survived
11:19
at least two uh
11:20
efforts to
11:22
get rid of him that's great you know i
11:24
think the thing about being a Petaluman
11:26
is you actually are supposed to be an
11:28
affront to somebody anyway so it was
11:31
right there with that
11:33
and john you're the one who called us
11:34
all together tonight
11:36
so tell us tell us it's 100th birthday
11:38
tonight Bill Soberanes uh he's obviously
11:41
passed away but I mean this is this is
11:42
significant to you he's significant to
11:44
you you've written a whole book on the
11:45
town of Petaluma of and Bill Soberanes is
11:47
in it um
11:49
what what do you love about him why is
11:50
he so important to you
11:52
well you know I think growing up here he
11:54
was just the fabric of the town he was
11:56
part of the fabric I never thought about
11:58
it as a kid
11:59
he was a long time family friend of my
12:02
family and your family the ages
12:05
my father and your grandfather jim ages
12:08
both went to school with him at st
12:10
vincent's
12:11
and um I was actually featured in his
12:13
column the day after I was born which i
12:16
was
12:17
reminded of recently when when your
12:20
grandmother passed away topsy ages
12:21
recently and
12:23
just before she passed she sent me an
12:25
envelope with just that clipping from
12:28
1954
12:29
and my mother had been in labor for 18
12:32
hours at Petaluma general and the calls
12:34
coming in
12:35
to the hospital were overwhelming the
12:37
hospital and Bill reported that
12:39
and after she finally gave birth about
12:41
five o'clock in the afternoon there was
12:43
a champagne party held about one am that
12:47
night Bill is out on the beat trying to
12:49
find stories for his next column the
12:51
next day
12:52
and he
12:53
runs into your grandfather jim ages who
12:56
tells him come and have a glass of
12:58
champagne and bring them into the
12:59
champagne party where everyone's
13:00
toasting my birth
13:02
and that's what appears in the column
13:04
the next day I am the news item because
13:06
he can't find anything else to write
13:07
about
13:08
so i
13:09
the background I think for me you know
13:11
Petaluma in the 60s growing up here it
13:14
was a bit of a circus we had all kinds
13:16
of characters here everybody had a
13:18
nickname in town and Bill was one of the
13:21
ring masters he along with ron walters
13:23
who had a morning radio show on ktob you
13:26
tuned into both every morning I got up
13:28
before I went to school I listened to
13:30
ron walters gave us the news of the day
13:32
he called people around town to find out
13:34
what was going on you'd read Bill's
13:36
column every day he got home there was
13:38
news about people in town and it's just
13:40
the way you kept track of things and
13:41
they were ringmasters it was to me it
13:43
was a circus but I didn't know anything
13:46
different
13:47
and and that's
13:48
it's amazing to me when I look back at
13:50
Bill how many memories just are evoked
13:54
because he captured so much of the feel
13:56
of the town and the people and and the
13:58
way things were changing in town as well
13:59
which is very important
14:01
yeah because you uh I mean how many
14:03
people at this uh table have have
14:05
written for the argus I mean we have
14:08
all
14:09
hey you haven't
14:10
wow you know uh I have been appeared in
14:13
the argus but i'm not a writer for the
14:15
but you your words have appeared in
14:16
there yes okay so for free I want to
14:18
know they don't pay me you know
14:21
there was the explorer scout newspaper
14:23
yes let's talk about that because tom
14:25
and I were explorer scouts at the argus
14:27
courier
14:29
and the editor at the time was our troop
14:30
master it was uh gaines um
14:34
okay it was his last name was gaines he
14:35
was a great guy
14:37
russ ross ross game dance yes absolutely
14:40
for my time
14:41
yeah
14:42
it was a couple weeks ago
14:44
yeah
14:45
yeah and I delivered newspapers i
14:46
actually just pulled up the article
14:48
about you in 1954. oh no this is yeah
14:52
it's not so wacky you know what I mean
14:54
uh
14:55
you know it's like
14:56
your mother entered the the the hospital
14:59
at 5 15 tuesday afternoon when john
15:00
patrick was born things really happened
15:03
it seems all of the sheehy friends
15:04
decided they wanted to be the first to
15:06
know when the new baby arrives so for
15:07
the next 32 hours they kept the
15:09
telephone wires hot with hundreds of
15:10
phone calls as soon as the news of the
15:12
baby's birth was received these friends
15:14
through a big champagne party and the
15:15
bottles from this party will be saved
15:17
and presented to john patrick when he is
15:19
a little older that did not happen
15:21
[Laughter]
15:25
he goes on we are willing to bet the
15:26
Bill hospital has never received so many
15:28
calls over the birth of a baby as it did
15:30
in the case of john patrick sheehy
15:33
that's a thing right I mean he would go
15:34
downtown with his notepad right
15:36
interviewing randoms and he would write
15:38
in his he would have nope in his pocket
15:40
and he'd be writing himself notes to
15:41
compose his article later is that a
15:43
correct thing
15:45
yes
15:46
okay so he was the he was a journalist
15:48
but like
15:49
if you're if you're young person if you
15:51
or if you just moved to Petaluma you're
15:52
like okay so he wrote a wacky column
15:54
that was sometimes kind of fudging the
15:55
truth I mean
15:57
he
15:58
it's important to note that he also was
15:59
like a big booster of Petaluma it feels
16:02
like everything that he did centered
16:03
around
16:04
self-promotion and also promotion of
16:06
Petaluma don't wait till tomorrow boost
16:08
Petaluma today was that was that a quote
16:11
join the boost Petaluma movement yes in
16:13
all caps
16:14
all caps at the end of every column and
16:16
all capture the end of every column join
16:18
the boost Petaluma movement today
16:20
tell your friends about Petaluma and
16:23
that was just his movement I mean it
16:24
wasn't an official thing was it just
16:26
promoted it every single day why why do
16:29
we think he felt I mean because it's a
16:30
funny because he loved Petaluma
16:32
you know what and if you look at where
16:33
he lived he lived right in the center of
16:35
this town wait a minute I don't think
16:37
it's a weird thing at all herb kane
16:39
loves san francisco talked about all
16:40
time gala baron talked about santa rosa
16:42
all the time I don't think there's
16:43
anything weird at all about a hometown
16:45
journalist wanting to promote his town
16:46
no I would just uh counter weird in
16:48
today's standards kind of
16:50
right because journalism has changed so
16:52
much yeah so he's he's weird in a
16:53
different way a few different ways
16:54
because I was thinking about you john
16:56
because I was going to ask about you
16:57
your words have appeared and you are
16:58
very by the book you and tom have very
17:00
different ideas about storytelling tom's
17:03
good with I mean really tom in my
17:05
opinion is the is the spiritual
17:06
successor to Bill zabranis I know that
17:08
it makes you very uncomfortable but he
17:10
certainly looks like him
17:12
no but he addresses tom gaffy famously
17:14
says to me all the time never he never
17:16
lets the truth get in the way of a good
17:17
story of course not
17:20
and and you're the opposite yeah i
17:22
footnote my story so you know
17:24
footnote to that actually john's mother
17:26
was according to the story john's mother
17:28
was in labor for about 32 hours and
17:31
several times during that labor she
17:33
would say I think he's coming now and he
17:35
would be saying no I don't think that's
17:36
exactly correct
17:39
in fact
17:42
well well I i think going back to what
17:44
chris nell had said is important because
17:46
Bill did he was not a journalist I don't
17:48
think anybody would would make that
17:49
claim he was a columnist and that was
17:52
different and disagree um
17:54
he modeled himself on hurricane and
17:56
hurricane established three dot
17:58
journalism down in san francisco and he
18:00
he served a very same function much like
18:03
Bill and the the whole boosterism i
18:05
think for Bill also
18:08
be was something to do with the time
18:10
itself and i've talked about this before
18:12
peddling was going through a major
18:14
transition and those of us growing up
18:15
here didn't realize that I didn't
18:17
realize it harlan I don't know if you
18:18
did but
18:19
you know until we saw the east side
18:21
start to explode in the in the 50s and
18:24
the 60s
18:26
this was a this was a chicken town in a
18:28
dairy town and that's what Bill came out
18:30
of him and my parents and your
18:32
grandparents and whatnot and suddenly we
18:34
were becoming a suburb and the chicken
18:36
and and the dairy industries were both
18:38
dying off in the 1950s the dairy
18:40
industry sort of recovered but it
18:42
consolidated the chickens were pretty
18:44
much gone the downtown was being
18:46
deserted and certainly we have these new
18:48
shopping malls pulling all the traffic
18:51
foot traffic over to the side and we
18:53
have all these new suburban homes going
18:55
in and the town is in an existential
18:58
crisis in a sense it doesn't know what
19:00
it is anymore
19:01
and Bill stepped into that void and so
19:04
for me when I look at what he did over
19:06
those years of boosting Petaluma he
19:08
tried to bring back a sense of
19:10
excitement he tried to recap he tried to
19:12
hold a sense of the eccentric nature of
19:14
the talent
19:16
and that was an important function i
19:17
think that's why he's so important he
19:19
wasn't just some flashy columnist
19:22
writing funny stories or something he
19:24
really filled a void and he made those
19:26
of us who grew up here feel like the
19:27
town was still a town that had some
19:29
uniqueness to it had some of the values
19:31
we'd grown up with and then he welcomed
19:33
new people who came to town and he was
19:35
really good about that he wasn't scared
19:37
about the future he wasn't scared about
19:39
change so john that was an interesting
19:40
statement uh he wasn't flashy but you
19:42
know what and he wasn't flashy but he
19:45
did the damn flashiest stuff i've seen
19:47
anybody do for crying out loud i'd even
19:49
heard a story about he was uh some some
19:52
friends of mine or some friends of my
19:53
parents were watching frank sinatra at
19:56
state line in uh tahoe and they walk
19:58
into the club and there's Bill uh
20:01
conducting les brown's orchestra for
20:03
crying out
20:04
uh
20:05
Bill starts the wrist wrestling
20:07
championship Bill comes up with the
20:09
whiskering the stuff he did was
20:11
absolutely flashy but this was not him
20:13
attempting to be flashy this was him
20:15
attempting to uh to make Petaluma flashy
20:18
i guess
20:19
and he did it in a very unflashy way
20:22
do you agree with that
20:24
um
20:25
i think Bill
20:26
was on the spectrum
20:28
yeah you know and I think he had adhd
20:31
and he was highly functioning he was
20:33
highly functioning person on the
20:34
spectrum and
20:36
um people i've known and i've had some
20:38
good friends like that they're somewhat
20:40
addicted to excitement and that's what
20:42
really Bill loved was the excitement he
20:44
loved the spotlight and that's partly
20:46
why I think he got into the camera and
20:48
it wasn't just taking photos of people
20:50
it was taking photos people in the
20:52
spotlight and then inserting himself in
20:55
the spotlight with them
20:56
and he'd love being around the
20:58
excitement and so I think it became
21:00
natural for him to start generating
21:02
excitement
21:03
my father said when they were growing up
21:05
in st vincent's
21:07
he had a million ideas a day he was just
21:09
spewing them all over the place people
21:10
couldn't keep up with the guy
21:12
so he had some he had this
21:14
entrepreneurial spirit to him and this
21:16
this appetite for excitement and he was
21:19
kind of hyperactive he just couldn't sit
21:21
still so I don't think he had
21:24
any choice in what he did but he
21:26
manifested himself beautifully in town
21:29
he really didn't and harlan knows him
21:31
from being a paper boy over in the east
21:33
side and what he came out of over there
21:35
was a really unique place you know
21:38
i moved to Petaluma when I was six years
21:40
old 1953
21:42
and uh margaret Soberanes his older
21:46
sister I think she was 11 years older
21:49
was my second grade teacher
21:52
back then we didn't learn to read till
21:54
second grade I think they learned them
21:55
much earlier these days started in
21:59
i we got the argus courier at home and i
22:02
i loved to read the paper
22:04
news stories were way beyond me I didn't
22:07
understand news stories but
22:09
bill
22:11
introduced us to the characters of
22:13
Petaluma he jumped it was easy reading
22:16
for a kid because he would he would name
22:19
names he would talk about diamond jim
22:21
diamond mike gilardi he would talk about
22:25
the ranchers who went and shot deer and
22:27
and their excapades he would talk about
22:31
events in town and
22:33
uh the people he introduced us to people
22:37
that we wouldn't have known I think he
22:39
did this to
22:40
a lot of people that didn't have a
22:42
social life
22:43
and I really enjoyed I read it every
22:46
single day i'd read about desert dan
22:48
delaney who I did
22:50
nobody knew who these people were but
22:52
Bill it was either Bill he admired he he
22:57
was always
22:58
complimentary to people he never he
23:00
never
23:01
criticized anything
23:03
um
23:04
i attribute that to
23:06
to his family uh margaret was the most
23:09
gentle person she never spoke of Bill at
23:12
school ever talked about that's my
23:15
brother you know she all she knew
23:17
everybody was familiar with Bill
23:19
uh but
23:21
she kept that aside I was their paper
23:25
boy uh for several years uh he was never
23:28
home of course when i
23:31
we would see him walking when were when
23:33
we were young you know on my paper route
23:35
or when we're kids coming up to the show
23:38
up here
23:39
and he was always friendly he was he
23:41
never dismissed anybody that I know of
23:44
he he gave you an ear
23:47
we would make up stories to get our name
23:49
in the paper we'd say
23:51
you know we're gonna have a football
23:52
game with the with the east side west
23:54
side and and he ate it up and he'd write
23:56
or scribble our names down and they'd be
23:58
misspelled in the paper the next day
24:00
but he he
24:02
he just enjoyed the life and I i
24:06
i I loved to
24:09
learn about like I put in my column
24:12
about him the who grew the biggest
24:14
zucchini in Petaluma and who
24:17
you know uh
24:18
the ladies that that were the neighbors
24:21
that he knew
24:22
uh
24:23
margaret was a super gentle person
24:27
and I like going through the archives i
24:29
found a story about
24:31
their mother margaret
24:33
and the I want to just read a couple of
24:37
sentences that I read about her because
24:39
i think this is what
24:41
how the family became who they were
24:44
and she was 70 years old at the time the
24:47
argus courier wrote this in 1952
24:50
before Bill was even a columnist
24:52
and I i do want to mention that I i love
24:55
the heading on his column so they tell
24:57
me with Bill ceranis it just fit for a
25:00
little kid so they tell me and it was
25:02
these brief items but margaret Soberanes
25:06
they
25:07
they
25:08
she moved into that house on east
25:10
washington apparently in 1903
25:13
and he was already 40 or 50 years old
25:15
the home and this is just for modern day
25:17
people it's across from that starbucks
25:19
is that correct this is a yes yes the
25:21
one that's like right before whole foods
25:23
right in the kind of the middle of
25:24
washington that's right okay that's a
25:25
white gothic house built in the 1860s at
25:28
the time uh
25:30
in the 50s when I was through in their
25:33
say late 50s there was uh
25:37
margaret Soberanes's family the
25:39
caufield's meat market
25:40
and lamar lawrence and ran the grocery
25:42
store okay and then there was the side
25:45
garage and of course the tivoli on the
25:46
corner yeah and uh
25:49
so margaret the the senior margaret
25:52
uh
25:53
she mentioned working in the uh the
25:55
times have changed at when she read that
25:58
when she was interviewed and she
26:00
told about working in the starch factory
26:03
and in the apple cannery and that it was
26:06
sad that the pickle factory and the
26:08
tannery were gone
26:10
so these it really was the industrial
26:12
side of town and she
26:14
apparently worked there she went to
26:16
saint vincent's also
26:18
margaret we knew we went to dominican
26:21
somehow we knew that apparently Bill
26:23
would write about her but
26:25
later on when I became a writer I wanted
26:27
to do a story on margaret and she said
26:30
oh no no no i'm i'm a private person and
26:32
i wouldn't let billy write about me you
26:34
know and that's why we never really
26:36
saw anything about her in the in the
26:38
paper
26:39
but I in this story about about his
26:42
mother
26:43
it said that uh
26:45
that she possesses a calmness and
26:47
contentment that is enviable in these
26:50
high blood pressure in this high blood
26:52
pressure age
26:53
she believes happiness to a large extent
26:57
must come from the work that one does
26:59
people are freer today to choose what
27:02
they did to make themselves happy
27:05
and I think that she imparted that on
27:07
Bill to make yourself happy you don't
27:10
have to make a living I can't prove that
27:12
but he did what he wanted he made his
27:15
life but he he opened the doors to these
27:18
characters they weren't all characters
27:20
they were businessmen they were all
27:22
walks of life that
27:24
kids never would have known by going
27:26
uptown you know but we knew everybody
27:29
was friendly everybody it's he made us
27:31
think we knew these people and I i
27:34
i thrived on that and I learned to read
27:37
and I i loved reading that as well as
27:40
the argus courier they had the old ap
27:43
stories back then but they had all the
27:45
the local stuff
27:47
the city council meetings and the uh
27:49
events so you talked about a story when
27:51
he like went on stage and supposedly
27:53
conducted frank sinatra's yes I mean it
27:55
seems like he was kind of a conductor of
27:56
people you know what I mean it seems
27:58
like Petaluma was sort of like his venue
28:00
and he would just sort of like his
28:01
column was the place where he would do
28:03
his you know connect this with that and
28:04
we're going to talk about this and he he
28:06
created characters he created actions so
28:08
that he could be in the center of the
28:10
action it seems like and in doing so he
28:12
kind of built a community where
28:13
everybody felt like they knew each other
28:14
was that purposeful or was that
28:16
accidental john what do you think
28:19
i think a little bit of both I mean I i
28:20
think he found himself
28:23
you know arlen was talking about where
28:25
he grew up and one thing that struck me
28:28
looking at his background his father who
28:29
ran the shoe factory in town for many
28:32
years um
28:34
died when he was young and that was
28:35
something that happened to my father and
28:37
happened to your grandfather jim ages as
28:39
well and I look at these young men at
28:42
the time and what struck me about all of
28:45
them is they all grew up in
28:46
neighborhoods in town where a lot of
28:48
family members lived on the block
28:50
and that was Bill's case with the
28:52
caulfield family he descended from
28:55
thomas caulfield who ran the stockyards
28:57
in town and he had all these cousins
29:00
living on the block and his
29:02
two and uncles as well his two older
29:04
uncles tom and will caulfield who took
29:06
over the stockyard operations there they
29:09
became his mentors and that was the same
29:11
for my father on basset street and my
29:13
father also became
29:16
a surrogate son of diamond mike gilardi
29:19
and so did Bill
29:20
because he ran he ran the swankiest
29:22
cocktail lounge in town and my father
29:25
when he got out of the service became
29:26
one of the the bartenders there known as
29:29
the sheik
29:30
and Bill started hanging out there as
29:32
well so I think what Bill saw with
29:34
diamond mike
29:36
is mike was a conductor he had a scene
29:39
this was where the smart set as Bill
29:41
talked about he wrote about this for the
29:42
rest of his life the smart set met after
29:45
the war there through the 40s and 50s
29:47
and my mother was part of that smart set
29:49
and that's where she met my father and
29:50
they married and Bill tried to date my
29:52
mother
29:53
drove her up to the top of the you know
29:55
west hills there after a movie and
29:57
dinner and tried to kiss her and she
29:58
slapped him properly and standing on his
30:00
way but
30:01
they remain lifelong friends because she
30:03
was one of his informants as tom gaffey
30:06
was and he not only didn't make his beat
30:08
he had all these informants all over
30:09
town and so I think you're exactly spot
30:12
on he connected the dots because he
30:14
talked to everybody and he would know
30:16
that they were given news my mother
30:18
loved gossip she had started as a gossip
30:21
columnist herself when she was younger
30:22
so they would get together we'd
30:24
sometimes pick up Bill when he was going
30:27
back to the east side or whatever in the
30:28
car and he'd get in with his camera bag
30:30
and his camera and his pipe and whatnot
30:33
and the two of them would go at it like
30:34
i've never i've never seen anything like
30:36
it was like fast paced you know back and
30:38
forth gossip updates and he'd keep all
30:41
that so he was he was a connector in
30:44
town I don't know that he was an
30:46
orchestrator in that sense in his mind i
30:48
think he was but you know
30:51
there are a lot of people who just you
30:52
know like my father for example just
30:54
kind of laughed at him all the time i
30:56
mean it wasn't a serious conductor
30:58
you're not like tom gavin he's the
31:00
accidental or uh conductor yes I never
31:02
felt that Bill
31:04
made it about himself right ever I you
31:07
would read about the wrist wrestling
31:09
tournament and it would always be the
31:11
contestants
31:13
who were who who were they it was very
31:15
few pronouns it was about who they were
31:18
not and about the event but not about
31:21
him creating it well this is the secret
31:23
he learned that the more names he put in
31:26
the column the more readership he got
31:28
and he made sure to pack that column
31:30
with as many names as he could you know
31:32
because everyone went to gossip I wanted
31:34
to find out what jim ages was up to and
31:36
then at lunch I would tell chris all
31:37
about it
31:39
to speak to harlan's point though Bill
31:42
didn't refer to himself in the column he
31:43
only referred to himself as this
31:45
columnist because in the old days
31:46
journalists didn't it wasn't considered
31:48
appropriate the column's not about you
31:50
the column is about your subject yes
31:52
though is very careful about that you
31:54
want to say he wasn't a journalist and i
31:56
say no
31:57
he
31:58
he provided a journal of what was going
32:00
on in Petaluma you know and it was not
32:02
about him it was about the people in his
32:05
column he attended a saint vincent's
32:07
reunion I believe it was
32:09
and he put every single name of the who
32:11
attended that in his column and
32:14
in wives husbands there must have been a
32:17
hundred names and you did
32:20
there was they all read it there was
32:22
everybody there was no sentences it was
32:24
just
32:24
that's what makes him a journalist
32:26
because if you want to know who went to
32:28
the event last night you look in the
32:30
column yeah who played in the game who
32:33
went to the party who was there I think
32:35
chris sampson might push back a little
32:36
bit on that there yeah I uh
32:39
he wrote for the news he wrote a column
32:41
for the newspaper so I would say he was
32:42
a columnist as a journalist he didn't
32:45
cover the news he didn't have a beat as
32:47
far as covering city council or crime
32:49
but he packed a lot of information about
32:51
Petaluma columnist
32:52
journalists in well there's a there's a
32:55
distinction sure there is in a wider
32:57
sense of journalism
33:00
you're talking about three journalists
33:01
here you know okay but but I i I think
33:04
the thing about Bill is that just he
33:06
loved meeting people and interesting
33:09
people um and he worked hard at it he
33:11
never got rich but he made his rounds uh
33:15
i don't know he worked he walked like
33:17
16 or 20 miles a day and he hit all
33:20
these places of you know vulpes the
33:22
hideaway just around town
33:25
writing names in his notebook like you
33:26
said but um
33:28
you know after
33:29
um i'm not he he wrote a column for 49
33:32
years but at one point he started a
33:34
feature called my fascinating world of
33:36
people and every
33:38
one of those would have a picture of him
33:41
with somebody fascinating sometimes it
33:43
would be the time he met the beatles
33:46
another time it was about these two
33:48
brothers the ham brothers
33:51
who their claim to fame was they were
33:52
heavy drinkers
33:54
and they looked alike
33:56
and uh one of them like was picked up by
33:59
police and thrown in the drunk tank and
34:01
the other brother went down to the
34:02
police station and took his place
34:04
unbeknownst to the police and one
34:06
brother came home so that was one of my
34:08
favorite uh fascinating world of people
34:10
columns but
34:11
Bill always hadn't really more
34:13
interesting than the beatles if he asked
34:14
yeah yeah
34:15
and and like harlan said
34:18
his column was very readable because it
34:20
was short bits three dot journalism
34:22
there's your journalism word chris like
34:24
uh like herb kane did but you know
34:27
there were just like little bits he
34:28
would have like a little headline over
34:30
every bit every paragraph like this and
34:32
that or miscellany or somebody's name
34:35
and then he would have these
34:36
uh pet phrases like um well you're
34:39
getting to be a real old-timer if you
34:41
remember when this shop was located on
34:44
kentucky street or um
34:46
crystal lonnell is now a member of my
34:48
dapper dan club who he would list you
34:50
know well-dressed uh uh man in town
34:54
and then if he wanted an answer to
34:55
something he'd say
34:56
is there anybody out there in reader
34:58
land who can tell me this
35:01
so he had these little uh pet phrases
35:03
that he used that he sprinkled regularly
35:05
throughout his columns well okay I think
35:07
to chris's point though chris linnell's
35:09
point it's like when everybody at this
35:11
table is gone who who interact with Bill
35:14
Soberanes and all the subjects and stuff
35:16
uh but Bill's columns live on on
35:18
newspapers.com and they're searchable
35:20
and all that they may be the only record
35:23
of
35:24
hundreds if not thousands of people
35:26
that's right you know I did my my
35:27
grandmother uh topsy aegis just died a
35:30
couple weeks ago and she's the last of
35:32
her generation of ages so now the family
35:34
tree is my dad and his sister and so i
35:37
was doing a lot of newspaper.com
35:38
searching and stuff and I learned so
35:39
much about the family and the history
35:41
and just because it's all there and so i
35:43
mean is that sort of where your point is
35:45
coming from that he was a journalist
35:46
because he he was documenting people
35:48
they may not have been city council
35:49
members but where is the line
35:52
like what is news you know what I mean
35:53
is is news only what are in the city
35:56
council minutes or is the news like what
35:59
the guy that owned the restaurant down
36:00
the street was like and i'm not
36:02
disagreeing or agreeing with anybody but
36:04
i think that's your point right I mean
36:05
he was documenting my point is the
36:07
journalism is what you make it
36:09
and
36:10
if journalism is just city council
36:12
minutes
36:13
it's a very limited view
36:15
i think journalism is keeping a record
36:17
for what happens in a town and part of
36:19
what happens in a town is who's out
36:21
drinking with whom and who played in
36:22
what game and who went to what party i
36:25
think it's same with uh gala baron and
36:28
with
36:29
herb kane and for that matter with jack
36:31
anderson
36:32
uh yeah well journalism can be
36:34
considered sort of an umbrella term sure
36:36
and anybody who writes for a newspaper
36:40
can be considered a journalist but you
36:41
have a columnist you have an editor you
36:43
have a reporter you have
36:45
sports editor and photographers they're
36:47
under the umbrella of journalists but
36:49
specifically he was a columnist not a
36:52
reporter yeah I didn't say it was a room
36:53
no I know but I think Bill thought of
36:55
himself dressed like a reporter well
36:57
well actually chris I want to phil
36:59
thought himself as a journalist and
37:00
that's no no he did not and so let me
37:03
tell you what he got himself as a
37:04
reporter at least wouldn't you say oh no
37:06
Bill Bill himself defined what he was
37:09
and he wrote about this in the columns
37:11
and in 1970 he sort of really came out
37:15
in branding himself he dropped the name
37:17
so they tell me from his column it
37:19
simply became Bill's apprentice and
37:21
that's when he defined himself as a
37:22
peopleologist and part of being a
37:24
peopleologist he said was not being a
37:26
journalist because journalists
37:28
essentially stay behind the camera they
37:30
say out of the story and yet he'd like
37:33
to get into the story and he'd like to
37:35
be in the action of the story and
37:38
reporting from that place so he made a
37:40
very clear delineation at that time
37:43
in what he was doing in the paper and
37:46
that's when he he earmarked the term
37:48
peopleologist which he tried to get
37:50
webster dictionary to put into the
37:52
dictionary and they refused for years
37:54
and that went on that campaign went over
37:55
30 years I think
37:58
but the other thing that strikes me at
37:59
that time that he also does is
38:02
he turns the action on himself and
38:05
that's when he starts my fascinating
38:06
world of people too and in every one of
38:09
those stories he's always in the picture
38:11
with the fascinating person you know and
38:13
that becomes what Bill is he and it's
38:15
part of a new wave of journalism in the
38:17
60s and 70s which is called new
38:20
journalism
38:21
and tom wolf
38:22
is the epitome of that hunter s thompson
38:25
who I loved when I was in high school
38:26
tom and i
38:27
really had almost killed this and tom
38:29
was the editor of our high school
38:30
newspaper I want to say that he was my
38:32
editor um but yeah new journalism was
38:36
the journalist actually puts himself
38:37
into the story so Bill witness was in a
38:40
sense branding himself with this new
38:42
movement that was going on he was a new
38:43
journalist in a sense
38:45
it's a fascinating world oh go ahead go
38:46
ahead oh I was gonna say that yeah then
38:48
that pretty much makes him a journalist
38:50
yeah under these new terms under this
38:53
new
38:53
his own definition yeah but you know
38:55
that was in the 70s which is no longer
38:57
new I was
39:02
but to jim's original point I don't
39:04
think you find many columnists writing
39:06
like this today I mean I i kind of
39:09
oh
39:10
would you find that but you but you find
39:12
like you know what's interesting though
39:13
he was ahead of his time you find like
39:14
bloggers writing oh yeah I was gonna say
39:16
you have to include everybody on
39:17
facebook tick tock twitter I mean you
39:19
know that's true he was ahead of his
39:21
time in terms of the photos with the
39:23
people
39:25
the selfies
39:26
who wrote the story uh Bill might have
39:28
been the the original photobomber was
39:30
that
39:30
was that chris that no it's well it's
39:32
john's line
39:33
yeah but I think it was news
39:35
i
39:36
stole it from chris sampson I think
39:39
oh yeah no you had an article how
39:41
Petaluma Bill cebranus became the king
39:43
of photobombing
39:44
uh actually there's a uh
39:47
david templeton wrote a piece last week
39:49
but but I wrote an article it'll be in
39:50
this week's argus about how Bill um got
39:53
those 45 000 photos taken with different
39:56
people okay
39:58
i got my wires crossed okay um
40:00
well so okay I think there's a lot of
40:02
very funny stories in those photos right
40:06
the way that he like scored the photos
40:07
with the different people
40:09
can we kind of like just kind of do an
40:10
open forum here like what was the one
40:12
where he got in the elevator and got the
40:13
shot and got the hell out of there was
40:15
that so here's a story that i'd heard a
40:18
long time ago and maybe somebody here
40:19
can tell me if it happened uh anwar
40:21
sadat was in san francisco and he was
40:24
not doing interviews he was here for
40:25
business only and he wasn't going to
40:27
talk with any newspaper people yet so
40:29
the newspaper people were all cued in
40:31
the lobby of the fairmont or whatever
40:33
former president of egypt for the
40:35
university
40:36
[Laughter]
40:38
and there was a lot going on with that
40:40
guy at this time it was uh and and so
40:42
everybody wanted to talk to him he
40:44
wasn't gonna talk to anybody uh they're
40:45
all waiting in the lobby of wherever the
40:47
hotel was the elevator comes down the
40:49
door opens up and who's on the elevator
40:51
with them but Bill Soberanes
40:53
now that's the story that I heard can
40:55
anybody at this table uh
40:57
actually
40:59
has anybody heard that besides yes
41:00
actually
41:02
anwar told that to me personally i
41:09
no actually uh you know I met uh Bill
41:11
introduced me to art link letter one day
41:13
i took him out to the um
41:15
what's the name of the
41:16
pink elephant in monterrey or yeah pink
41:19
pink elephant and I don't remember what
41:21
the event was but I drove him out there
41:22
he wanted to go out there
41:24
bohemian grove maybe yeah that's right
41:26
it may have been a bohemian grove
41:27
gathering yeah in any case uh we get
41:30
there and uh
41:31
we go inside and art link letter's there
41:34
and uh Bill says I want you to come come
41:36
here I want you to meet hard link letter
41:37
so he comes over and he introduces me to
41:39
art link letter art link letter who
41:42
arguably could be called a journalist
41:44
because
41:45
why not same stroke of the pen as Bill
41:48
but
41:49
art who to me was an icon I mean as a
41:52
kid growing up I saw him on tv and he
41:54
was 94 I think
41:56
and he looked fantastic he looked better
41:58
than william shatner did when he came
41:59
out of space who looked really good but
42:02
he
42:03
from the second Bill introduced me
42:07
art wouldn't stop talking about Bill
42:09
Bill was the star art didn't talk about
42:11
art art didn't talk about you know about
42:13
his time in tv he was talking about Bill
42:16
Bill was the interesting character at
42:18
art of course that's kind of what art's
42:19
bag was much like Bill it's probably why
42:21
they got along so well but I was just
42:24
amazed here is art link litter
42:27
you know who i'd seen since I was a kid
42:29
and he's talking about phil sabranus i
42:31
thought this is incredible if you see
42:33
Bill in a lot of these photos it's sort
42:34
of like the person with them if it's a
42:36
famous person this is sort of this has a
42:38
deer in the headlights look like yeah
42:41
yeah who is this guy um
42:43
i uh
42:45
was in the newsroom at the argus when i
42:46
was on the boulevard this was in the
42:48
late 70s and uh I was going to go up and
42:50
cover a speech by angela davis the
42:52
activist and author at srjc and Bill
42:55
said oh can I go along too so I went up
42:57
and I covered it like a reporter and did
42:59
you know exactly what he was doing like
43:01
did you know well yeah he said he after
43:04
the he I knew he want to have his
43:05
picture taken are you holding the camera
43:07
well
43:08
he
43:09
he always said here take two real quick
43:12
take a take
43:14
he didn't meet angela davis we uh got to
43:16
go backstage because we had our press
43:18
passes and he he hands me the camera and
43:20
he goes right next to her says quick and
43:22
so she doesn't know who who he is but um
43:26
she didn't talk to art lincoln no no but
43:28
around that same time I interviewed Bill
43:31
i think this was
43:32
for a 1977
43:35
top of the bay special edition that the
43:37
argus used to do
43:38
and he told me how he got his photo with
43:40
the the beatles um they were going to
43:42
appear this is 1964 they were going to
43:45
appear at a concert at the cow palace
43:47
and they arrived at the airport and the
43:49
crowd was going wild as you know those
43:51
the beatles heyday and uh they had a
43:56
they put up an impromptu fence to keep
43:58
the crowd out and Bill heard from
44:01
somebody that they were going to be
44:02
staying at the hilton hotel so he gets
44:03
in a cab speeds over to the hilton hotel
44:05
he arrives just as the beatles are
44:08
showing up
44:09
and the security guard recognizes Bill
44:12
and lets them walk right in with the
44:13
beatles he goes up to their hotel room
44:16
and then he follows them down to the
44:18
podium where they're giving a press
44:20
conference and in that photo there's the
44:21
beatles and there's Bill
44:23
on the left just standing there
44:25
with a big grin on his face yeah yeah
44:27
just it's like it's like the
44:30
the photo bombing like we said before
44:33
you got to tell the jimmy carter story
44:35
because because so your your article
44:36
actually got published today and they
44:38
they titled it how Petaluma's Bill
44:39
Soberanes became the king of photobombing
44:41
and in that article you talk about uh
44:44
getting photo with jimmy carter and that
44:45
is a great story yeah it was same kind
44:47
of a deal
44:48
jimmy carter was actually campaigning
44:50
for president this was uh
44:52
1976
44:54
and he came to san francisco um
44:57
uh you know as part of his campaign trip
44:59
and uh
45:01
Bill goes to the airport with a lawyer
45:03
friend named george davis who's uh
45:06
who knows carter and they the secret
45:08
service say no you can't get in
45:11
but um
45:12
but they call their headquarters and
45:13
they find out that I guess they talk to
45:15
carter and they find out that your
45:17
friend george davis is here with this
45:19
reporter can you be let him in he says
45:20
okay let him in
45:22
so
45:23
they go in Bill is able to ride in the
45:25
motorcade to downtown san francisco
45:29
and you know has his picture taken with
45:31
carter holt they're holding their hands
45:33
up together in sort of a victory salute
45:36
and it was uh in that story I i quoted
45:40
an article um
45:42
a comment that jimmy payne made
45:45
to the press democrat after Bill died he
45:47
said
45:48
it was just incredible he could get in
45:50
with anybody he didn't know you know but
45:52
Bill just had this uncanny knack for
45:54
being able to
45:56
um
45:57
you know get in the room or get in an
45:59
elevator
46:00
with uh
46:01
famous people but a lot of those 45 000
46:04
people were like the ham brothers or
46:07
just regular people in town but
46:09
his ability to get these photos taken
46:11
with the you know celebrities jane
46:14
mansfield five different
46:16
presidents was amazing i'd like uh chris
46:18
to elaborate on Bill's uh
46:22
habit of putting his arm around people
46:24
when they
46:25
so they couldn't crop him out he'd
46:27
always have
46:30
a big mystery hand there and I want you
46:33
to tell your story about why Bill's
46:35
right arm was always tan
46:38
uh he wrote a piece one time about uh
46:41
he he rode to arizona with some friends
46:44
of course we all knew he didn't drive
46:46
so
46:47
he rode to arizona and when he got back
46:49
he he wrote about how his arm was all
46:52
suntan and sunburned but just one arm
46:55
because it was hanging out the window
46:57
and the other arm was pale and white
47:02
another item he wrote about uh going to
47:04
santa rosa and he spotted four dead
47:07
skunks and two dead raccoons and he says
47:10
does that mean there's more skunks out
47:12
there than raccoons
47:15
so he was also a scientist I would have
47:17
the exact same
47:18
that's a journalist you know I want to i
47:20
want to know something we've
47:22
spoken about the fact that building
47:24
drive but I distinctly heard you say
47:26
that he tried he drove your mother up to
47:28
yes the the top of uh la crested drive
47:31
so and he came back he uh in a car yes
47:34
in a car
47:36
he did drive at one time and he he
47:38
graduated from saint vincent's 1941 and
47:41
then pearl harbor happened six months
47:43
after he got out of high school and he
47:45
joined the I think the national guard
47:46
first then he joined the merchant marine
47:48
he was assigned south pacific and
47:50
whatnot he was home on leave 1944 that's
47:53
when he met my mother she was working in
47:55
pete fundus's candy shop behind the soda
47:57
fountain which he will he wrote about
47:59
for the next 50 years is the place where
48:01
the prettiest girls in town even when my
48:04
mother died four months before him in
48:06
her column in his calm the next day was
48:08
she worked at
48:10
pete fundus's candy shop where the
48:11
prettiest girls in town work so that's
48:13
where he met her took her out on the
48:15
date drove her up uh to the top of la
48:17
crestas she slapped him and probably
48:19
hadn't taken her home
48:20
two weeks later he's still home on leave
48:23
1944 and he's got the family car I don't
48:26
know if it was his mother maggie's car
48:27
whatever his uncle's and he smashes it
48:30
in some lady driver on g street and
48:33
after it totaled the car and after that
48:35
he never drove
48:37
and he walked everywhere he as chris i
48:39
mean i've seen different reports
48:41
in the early days they said he walked 20
48:43
miles a day and by the time I think you
48:45
came on the scene you reported 16 miles
48:47
a day so he was
48:49
just cutting back
48:50
[Laughter]
48:51
are there any other good stories about
48:53
him and the celebrities there were
48:55
other stories um
48:57
about presidents I don't know if this is
48:59
in your collection about herbert hoover
49:01
former president from the uh depression
49:03
days um Bill went to try to get an
49:06
interview with him at a gathering in san
49:07
francisco and he fell off the platform
49:10
and hoover watched this and felt so bad
49:12
he had he come up to the platform he got
49:14
the interview out of that okay
49:16
then there's another time in the 50s he
49:18
um he goes with two penalty businessmen
49:22
to sacramento to meet with the mayor
49:24
goodwin knight was his name and they're
49:26
out in the outer office and the
49:28
secretary puts in or come on and says um
49:31
governor the the party from Petaluma is
49:33
here mr barless mr matson and then she
49:36
starts to spell Bill's name and mr
49:39
s.o.b
49:43
the governor yells let mr matson mr
49:46
bartles and that sob in here right now
49:48
[Laughter]
49:53
he's also known as the man um
49:56
who who fell the hardest for lauren
49:58
bacall because when he met her at a
50:01
press conference in san francisco he
50:02
went up to take her hand and he fell
50:04
flat on her face in front of her
50:07
he fell flat on his face
50:08
right he fell on his face so um
50:11
and I i one other thing I i think we
50:13
should mention here his many trips to
50:15
san francisco and being in that scene
50:17
and meeting all these celebrities that
50:19
was the only connection we had when i
50:21
was a kid to to the big celebrities
50:23
outside of Petaluma I mean that was he
50:26
connected us to the national stage even
50:28
though it was kind of a goofy way off in
50:30
there just a photo bomb
50:32
we felt like hey we're important we're
50:34
connected with what's going on out there
50:36
well because it's important to mention
50:38
that like this area wasn't a place where
50:40
celebrities would come and like spend
50:41
their weekends you know I mean we
50:42
nowadays it's not uncommon for you to
50:44
hear you know whatever lady gaga's in
50:46
napa or you know madonna or kanye was
50:49
over in sonoma this was not that back
50:51
then well with one exception yeah
50:54
Petaluma hotel
50:56
they used to stop yeah people coming up
50:58
on redwood highway from san francisco
51:00
north they'd right
51:01
it was the it was the bohemian club too
51:04
yeah and so the redwood room in the
51:06
Petaluma hotel which is where the
51:08
truckery is now which was across the
51:10
corner from gelardi's
51:12
corner those are the two cocktail
51:13
lounges that was that was uh really
51:16
cocktail row in Petaluma and they were
51:19
well known people would stop on their
51:21
way to and from the bohemian club there
51:23
would be limousines parked lined up on
51:26
east washington street okay in the 50s
51:29
and that's where people would go in
51:30
they'd heard earl bond we'd play in the
51:32
oregon and the redwood club they'd be
51:34
playing dice over at gillardy's or
51:36
betting on the horses in the back room
51:37
and that was well known among the hot
51:40
sea tatsys coming up from san francisco
51:43
well he could just go fishing there
51:44
every weekend then right I mean you get
51:45
his photo
51:48
what about his connection to harry
51:49
houdini who by the way played on this
51:51
stage so many years ago I think you have
51:54
to talk to tom gaffey yeah well I mean
51:56
it's
51:57
well uh
51:59
as far as Bill's connection Bill uh and
52:02
i'm not sure when it started Bill uh
52:04
after uh uh so after harry houdini died
52:07
he and his wife had set up a message
52:09
that he would try to impart or she would
52:12
try to impart depending on who died uh
52:15
let's see if seances can really happen
52:17
let's see if we can communicate with the
52:18
dead so he left a a message locked away
52:22
and his wife for 10 years after
52:24
houdini's death were having seances
52:27
uh to try and bring him back and and
52:29
they got nothing
52:31
harry didn't come back there was
52:32
probably no money in it
52:33
but
52:34
um
52:36
other people decided to carry on
52:38
the tradition and i'm not sure when when
52:41
did that start katie do you remember
52:43
when
52:44
no
52:45
the society of american magicians right
52:48
yeah why did why did how did this how
52:50
the story started why why did he
52:53
like why like why did he that's that's
52:55
the question like why was Bill so
52:57
interested in society of american
52:58
magicians was trying to carry this
53:01
seance forward because it promoted their
53:03
their profession and Bill had a lot of
53:05
friends who were magicians
53:07
and uh really and I think Bill saw an
53:10
opportunity they didn't want to do it
53:11
anymore and Bill thought what the hell
53:13
this is another great Petaluma thing
53:14
yeah yeah so he's oh we're going to have
53:15
the seance right here this is the
53:17
official he would tell if this is the
53:18
official harry houdini he was calling
53:20
you because nobody else was doing it
53:22
okay so it existed before him and he
53:24
just kind of took it over yes okay he's
53:26
like
53:34
okay so that's that's very much in the
53:36
vein of the other creations as well i
53:38
mean did he actually invent the wrist
53:39
wrestling thing or was that somewhere
53:40
else first no but he certainly saw the
53:42
opportunity he promoted it from
53:45
by being at gilardi's all the time so it
53:47
was already going on
53:49
well I think they made a big deal of
53:51
staging that first big event although
53:54
i think the musclemen were always doing
53:56
it at the bar right that's my
53:58
understanding was that in uh
54:00
he saw people men wrist wrestling or
54:03
what he called it wrist wrestling arm
54:04
wrestling wrist wrestling at the bar at
54:06
gilardi's and then
54:08
he he arranged a match between
54:11
um
54:13
uh jack holmel who was a trainer for the
54:15
detroit tigers baseball team and a local
54:18
rancher named oliver kolberg
54:21
and uh it was held in january of 1955
54:24
and that was the first
54:26
you know
54:27
sanctioned or official wrist wrestling
54:29
match it wasn't the world
54:31
championship yet I don't think that
54:33
happened
54:34
until
54:35
the 60s
54:36
but but uh it was it happened in
54:38
gilardy's bar which is where the bank of
54:40
america parking lot is right here
54:41
downtown and they they wrestled for um
54:46
uh
54:47
three minutes and it was a draw now i
54:50
double checked it was 1955.
54:52
55. that that was this this is Bill's
54:55
data you know yeah
54:56
okay well but wrist wrestling was a
54:58
regular betting game in gilardi's at the
55:01
time okay so and so as they were saying
55:02
he saw and he saw things he could like
55:04
promote he saw the excitement of the
55:07
other patrons at the bar betting on the
55:09
two contestants okay and he'd known Jack
55:12
Hummel hung out at Gillardy's went off
55:14
season of the Detroit Tigers and he
55:16
bragged about being able to beat
55:18
everybody in the world by wrist
55:20
wrestling and kohlberg at the time was
55:22
also the strongest man he lived in
55:23
Lakeville it was a
55:25
big 250 pound strongest man town so Bill
55:28
had that idea but as I said you know
55:30
like my father said Bill had a thousand
55:32
ideas a day I mean
55:35
i mean he was starting things all the
55:36
time but he did sense that
55:38
and what surprised him I think is after
55:40
that event in
55:41
january 1955 there was such an
55:44
outpouring of excitement that's all
55:46
people talked about and they really him
55:48
and diamond mike lardy and um and hummel
55:51
decided to start a regular thing and it
55:54
was a benefit for the march of dimes
55:56
when it started the first time it was
55:57
part of a general sports event that went
56:00
on every year I love in katie's column
56:02
you write about it you say he created
56:04
and or promoted a wider array of events
56:06
did he did he create much
56:09
like what what did he create and i'm not
56:11
saying that as a criticism to him
56:12
because it seems like there's a there's
56:13
a trend here where he's like you're
56:15
doing something i'm going to make it
56:17
bigly exactly yeah exactly because we
56:20
always come back to what john said he
56:22
wanted to make Petaluma
56:25
something and he wanted the people of
56:27
the town to be something right
56:30
and yeah and the real talent is not
56:32
necessarily creating something the real
56:34
talent is recognizing something's
56:36
potential and promoting it
56:38
that's what Bill was a genius exactly
56:40
Bill would see things like the
56:42
whiskerino contest and the ugly dog
56:44
contest he'd see things that were
56:45
happening and think you know this would
56:46
be a great he could he could visualize
56:48
how this could make put Petaluma on the
56:50
map
56:51
and he did it with each of these events
56:53
i mean certainly the ugly dog I mean
56:54
that that's still going on yeah
56:56
wrestling has moved out of town but the
56:58
ugly dog contest is probably the last
57:01
remaining Bill sobranas iconic
57:04
promotional device that is still here in
57:07
Petaluma and is still happening today
57:10
whiskering is on hiatus only because of
57:13
kovid yeah but it will come back but
57:15
then again that's uh kind of all over
57:17
the world now
57:18
it always works wrestling
57:21
but the ugly dog contest is still a
57:23
peddling event at least unless we give
57:25
away the fairgrounds and I would say to
57:26
your point uh I believe it's one of the
57:29
few surefire national news stories that
57:32
comes out of Petaluma every year
57:34
every year I almost forget that it's
57:36
happening here I live here and i'll see
57:38
it like in the national newspaper like
57:39
world's ugliest dog crap just as wrist
57:41
wrestling was yeah when abc was here
57:44
yeah okay
57:45
those first years with wrist wrestling
57:47
was all locals yeah all locals
57:50
and
57:52
what another event that came out of that
57:54
was the walk-a-thon from someone and
57:56
that was all locals
57:58
and it was big he promoted that it got
58:01
such participation
58:04
but he never walked he never walked he
58:06
never arm
58:09
every year starting 1956.
58:11
he got hundreds of people to walk he
58:13
never walked he wasn't an athlete he was
58:15
a journalist he was an impresario easy
58:17
easy
58:18
but the weird thing is he walked that
58:19
amount of of mileage every day
58:23
he got his steps in he got his steps in
58:25
and again ahead of his time he's part of
58:26
the bs healthcare well I don't think you
58:28
know one story I love about Bill is
58:30
after he gets back from the merchant
58:32
marine in 47 or whatnot he kind of
58:34
knocks around trying to find a
58:35
profession and he's a hay baler he's
58:38
selling at trading hay and he's working
58:40
for his uncle tom caulfield out the
58:42
stockyards uh as a rodeo kind of roundup
58:45
guy
58:46
but he complains that work gets in the
58:49
way of talking
58:51
this is the problem for him
58:54
and I had I suspect on the walkathon
58:56
there wasn't enough talking I mean you
58:57
know it's like
58:59
he got bored so he was going to walk for
59:00
20 miles away a bunch of people the same
59:02
people I mean
59:04
i was I was going to note this this is
59:07
totally off base but
59:09
Bill and I interviewed the last
59:12
surviving egg day queen in
59:14
1998 1997 98 and he knew where she lived
59:19
and I didn't and obviously he didn't
59:21
drive so I buckled him into his seat
59:24
belt and my little car and off we went
59:26
and he wouldn't tell me where we were
59:28
going which made it a little difficult
59:30
but it was pretty much well turned here
59:32
so I was just going to turn there
59:34
no
59:38
so we we turned on the right on the on
59:41
the proper street and he says well i
59:43
think thinks i'm going to go
59:45
i'm going to have to look at look at my
59:46
paper here and you look at it upside
59:48
down and I turned it up and he said yeah
59:50
yeah it's number 27.
59:53
and so I uh I turned and I saw that
59:55
number 27 was on my left
59:58
and Bill looked over there and then he
60:00
looked to the right and he said I used
60:02
to come here all the time when I was a
60:04
kid it was over here on that
60:09
so I found out from the egg day queen's
60:11
daughter that Bill had uh had one of his
60:14
friends had lived on that side and he
60:16
had just gotten confused
60:18
[Laughter]
60:20
who was turned no they didn't move the
60:21
house the the queen was ruth shoston
60:24
west
60:26
yeah you know in the lead-up to this
60:28
thing I didn't I didn't realize he did
60:30
so much more than just the seance the
60:32
ugly dog the whiskerino the wrist
60:34
wrestling I mean
60:35
he he had riverboat rowboat contest he
60:38
had something called the old adobe
60:39
fiesta table tennis championships I mean
60:41
he was just throwing stuff at the wall
60:43
and don't forget the centennial I would
60:45
not I would never yeah of course okay
60:48
yeah the the those columns leading up to
60:51
to the centennial were just huge boost
60:54
Petaluma now grow isn't that where
60:56
whiskerino came from was the centennial
60:59
1858 1958 right should know too I want
61:02
you to finish your point that whiskerino
61:03
now takes place in this building every
61:05
year yes it does the phoenix theater yes
61:07
which is where it should be yeah hey it
61:09
all should take the ugly dog should take
61:11
place here
61:13
but he had and then he would spotlight
61:15
like hundreds of other events as well i
61:17
i just love that he was like a one-man
61:20
one-man movement with this boost
61:22
Petaluma exactly I mean it just seems
61:24
like he didn't have like it was not like
61:26
a non-profit it wasn't like you know we
61:28
meet once a month to discuss it he just
61:30
was like this is what we're doing let's
61:31
go i'm going to use my column to do that
61:32
well I you know I think on that point
61:34
too
61:35
this was a town that was predisposed to
61:37
that
61:38
and what Bill looked to as a bottle was
61:40
burke kerrigan who was brought here by
61:42
the chamber of commerce in 1917 or
61:44
whatever to promote the egg basket of
61:46
the world that was his term and he put
61:48
on all these events and he did all these
61:50
things down in san francisco where he'd
61:52
take planes and and drop feathers with
61:54
little coupons to get a dozen eggs and
61:57
he really built the buzz and the whole
61:59
town just lived on being the basque of
62:01
the world for so long we punched above
62:03
our weight in a sense and so we were
62:05
prone to that and a lot of people just
62:07
hungry for that and that's what Bill fed
62:10
into naturally right there
62:12
well and you who is it is it the three
62:14
of you think that the kerrigan was
62:15
actually a scam artist
62:17
no no because i've heard i've heard him
62:19
talked about as a guy who who came in
62:21
and tried to sell a thing but it was
62:22
maybe he was more concerned with himself
62:25
than the town is that I think the
62:26
spending was the problem spending was
62:28
the problem that's what my understanding
62:30
is he was an olympic athlete they hired
62:32
him for the job specifically yeah and he
62:34
didn't obviously did a good job of it
62:37
yeah there was some financial difficulty
62:39
and as in what he took too much money he
62:42
spent too much money
62:43
it just went crazy I mean he was like
62:44
Bill you know he just went full out and
62:47
that's what Bill saw as a model and Bill
62:49
tells a story where he met kerrigan
62:51
later uh I think in the 50s and kerrigan
62:54
advised him not to put all his eggs in
62:56
one basket
63:02
with the promotions that Bill uh wrote
63:04
about he also wrote about every
63:07
fraternal organization the elks would
63:09
have their meetings every reunion every
63:12
gathering every social gathering
63:15
fundraisers
63:16
they all got publicity through him
63:18
whether or not they were on the social
63:20
page or not many of them were but Bill
63:23
always added his
63:24
inflection to
63:26
to the moose lodge event and to
63:29
and it really made Petaluma feel like a
63:32
community of involvement
63:36
you're mentioning uh
63:38
bert carrigan and uh Bill was the second
63:41
recipient of the good egg award
63:44
in Petaluma and the first recipient was
63:46
adair lara later adair high who wrote
63:49
the book about the history book about
63:51
Petaluma
63:52
and she used the term which i've always
63:54
loved in the book describing Petaluma as
63:56
always being a shameless publicity hound
63:59
because you think of it you know the
64:01
the egg basket of the world uh Bill
64:04
Soberanes ugly dog contest there's just
64:06
been a lot of promotions and Bill was an
64:09
integral part of promoting Petaluma yep
64:11
exactly bert just had one
64:14
yeah burt just did the basket of the
64:16
world yeah he put all his eggs in the
64:18
same bag everything yeah he learned the
64:20
less than the hardware there yeah
64:21
yeah
64:22
Bill listened to kerrigan were you
64:24
saying no
64:26
yeah I mean it just seemed like he he
64:28
that was this was his like high
64:30
connecting with people uh
64:32
just being in the center of the action
64:34
it seems like he was like addicted to
64:35
that in in the best way any and and
64:38
whether whatever his situation was you
64:40
know in his autistic or not or adhd or
64:42
not just seemed like he found the thing
64:44
that really turned him on you know he
64:45
had the thing he found the thing that
64:46
gave him purpose and in doing so uh here
64:49
we are talking about him and I just i
64:51
think it's really good you know the line
64:53
about work getting in the way of talking
64:55
you know really
64:56
that notion
64:58
can apply to anybody's line of work i
65:00
mean if you ask tom gaffy what do you
65:02
think of work he'd say work gets in the
65:05
way of me hanging around the theater
65:06
yeah if you ask I try samson what do you
65:09
think about work work chris would say
65:12
work just gets in the way of my writing
65:14
i mean we all you know so I i don't
65:17
think it's it's a criticism of Bill to
65:19
say that the fact is that this revealed
65:21
what Bill's true calling in life was
65:23
yeah and let's face it what Bill did
65:26
was
65:26
the best job of doing that that anybody
65:29
on the planet has ever done
65:31
of being Bill yeah and I think we need
65:34
to really honor the person who saw the
65:36
potential in Bill for that
65:38
and she's really been written out of
65:40
history there's a lot of rumors that his
65:42
older sister margaret who was the school
65:45
teacher over at mckinley and tom I was
65:48
at mckinley with tom gaffey yeah yeah i
65:50
don't think I took missus I had miss
65:53
she was well so when we were there she
65:55
was the first grade teacher I think when
65:57
harlan was there she was a second grade
65:58
teacher I had mrs minton for first grade
66:01
and uh did not have mrs sobranos
66:05
oh you're right this is absolutely
66:07
correct
66:08
absolutely okay but let's clarify she
66:10
was not the person who mentored Bill or
66:12
rewrote his columns or edited them and
66:15
the woman who encouraged Bill to go into
66:18
writing a column for the petalman news
66:20
which was a
66:21
newspaper that only lasted about two
66:22
years here in Petaluma
66:24
was his cousin neddy rose caulfield
66:28
and she was the daughter will caulfield
66:30
who grew up two doors down from Bill and
66:33
uh nettie was a couple few years behind
66:36
Bill in school but she became a
66:38
freelance journalist and she her first
66:40
husband I think was a rodeo star and she
66:45
covered rodeos she was a horse woman and
66:47
she wrote for
66:49
harlan probably knows this uh hoofs and
66:52
hoofs and horns magazine
66:55
and also for the redwood redwood rancher
66:58
red rancher and she wrote for cat fancy
67:01
magazine
67:02
and her second husband was a motorcycle
67:04
racer and she wrote for motorcycle
67:06
racing magazines she's the one who
67:08
encouraged Bill to start the column
67:10
because he was running around taking
67:11
photos of all kinds of people at that
67:12
time and she's the one who helped him
67:15
start the column off in the petalman
67:16
news
67:17
and then she was a freelance writer
67:19
through the 80s
67:20
and when he started the wrist wrestling
67:22
contest
67:23
she was really the back
67:26
uh office person okay you had diamond
67:28
mike flashy guy you had Bill going uh
67:31
but the woman who was a secretary of the
67:34
wrist wrestling championship was neddy
67:36
rose and nettie rose I think is also the
67:38
one who helped him start writing feature
67:40
stories in the newspaper because before
67:42
that as chris described it it was three
67:44
dot journalism little snippets of this
67:46
and that um but then he started writing
67:48
these features about people and nettie
67:50
was behind that because she wrote for
67:52
the argus at times but she wrote feature
67:54
stories as a freelance writer and she
67:57
died in 86 and right before she died she
68:00
was always Bill always honored her in
68:02
his column and whatnot but she was
68:03
working on a history of the wrist
68:04
wrestling championship
68:06
which never saw the light of days
68:08
but I just want to acknowledge that i
68:10
recently discovered all this about
68:11
nettie and it's kind of an unknown
68:14
influence he really depended on her
68:15
quite a bit
68:18
also uh
68:19
sparky schultz picked up on the wrist
68:21
wrestling and made it a national
68:24
uh with publicity with peanuts
68:26
i'm not sure if it was televised before
68:28
that or if the television came I think
68:31
it came right after that because i
68:32
remember snoopy came to town and was
68:33
disqualified because he had no thumbs up
68:36
and that cartoon by schultz so yeah it
68:39
sold it yeah I think it was
68:41
1968 and then the then the
68:43
abc came in 69 I think yeah
68:46
was there any sense
68:47
that he
68:49
that he was sad about the direction of
68:51
the town was he a positive guy
68:53
emotionally did he ever open up about
68:55
where the town went
68:57
was he universally positive did was he
68:59
just did was he just not that way would
69:01
he not talk about his feelings
69:03
well I could I can start that answer
69:05
some of you who work with him probably
69:06
have different points of view but um
69:09
what I saw from him is that um he liked
69:12
the excitement he liked the new and so
69:15
he loved old Petaluma in many ways but
69:18
but the impulse toward the new was
69:20
stronger for him so he believed in
69:22
progress and part of what went on in the
69:23
60s when I was growing up he was saying
69:26
this is all great the east side is
69:27
expanding he he fought in the 50s to get
69:30
a second firehouse over on payron and d
69:33
street because the bridges would go up
69:35
and the fire trucks couldn't get over
69:36
there and people like harlan's family
69:39
were moving in in the early 50s because
69:40
they were starting the development over
69:42
by whole foods and then the freeway went
69:44
in so
69:45
he believed in progress in that sense
69:47
what always amazed me
69:49
is you get to the mid 60s and a lot of
69:52
the things that he cherished in town are
69:54
being torn down gilardy's bar
69:56
which is now the parking lot of the
69:59
bank of america he's seen in a photo
70:01
there right before they tear it down and
70:03
he writes about it but there's no
70:04
sadness it's just like this is the fact
70:06
this is progress uh
70:08
east washington street where he grew up
70:10
that's right my god it's a two-lane
70:12
street it's all family homes around him
70:15
suddenly mid 60 67 68 they widen it to
70:19
four lanes so people can get across town
70:21
now because that's the artery to the
70:23
east side of town which is exploded we
70:25
go from 8 000 people in 1945
70:28
in town to thirty two thousand by tom
70:31
tom and ira high school in 72. yeah that
70:33
was a huge explosion it was they they
70:36
demolished everything on his block
70:38
prayer I mean there were three houses
70:39
left down the entire east Petaluma
70:41
entrance disappeared so his whole other
70:44
side of the whole other side of the
70:46
street is blocked out
70:48
the corners where he lived are all
70:49
blocked and he's still living there and
70:51
isn't it weird that his house still
70:52
stands just the way it looked when the
70:54
day he died yeah probably the day he was
70:56
born it's eerie and yet he never
70:58
expressed any sadness about that it was
71:00
just like the nature of progress this is
71:02
what happens
71:04
i I think this speaks to
71:05
what we were all talking about before
71:07
that he was working on a different plane
71:09
than the rest of us I i don't think he
71:11
was really that in touch with
71:13
with this kind of stuff
71:15
he was still thinking of the stories i
71:17
think you're absolutely right that it
71:18
was the excitement and if it was new and
71:21
it was happening
71:22
he wasn't going to be
71:24
he wasn't gonna be a curmudgeon
71:26
who was standing against what was
71:28
happening whatever was happening that's
71:29
where he was gonna be because he was a
71:31
journalist and he he told the story of
71:33
what was going on and also being a
71:35
booster was part of that too it was it
71:37
was boosting the new yeah
71:39
in that vein by the way
71:41
was it was it Bill that said Petaluma's
71:44
we got a new taco bell and Bill's
71:46
article was that Petaluma is becoming
71:47
the culinary capital of yes
71:52
now tom you should know because every
71:54
day in high school tom drove me to the
71:56
taco bell on the east side
71:58
uh and you had the same you had same
72:00
lunch every day tacos
72:01
[Laughter]
72:05
and the beans and cheese yeah yeah so
72:07
you followed his advice there i
72:08
absolutely did
72:10
i agreed john you mentioned that that
72:12
Bill followed the society at gilardi's
72:15
and the redwood room but he also went to
72:18
to
72:19
all the bars he
72:21
all the time he mentioned the yosemite
72:22
hotel and two-ton tony mausolini that
72:25
ran it and
72:27
explain where that was too that was
72:29
right on the curve of it's been
72:31
straightened a bit now but on east
72:33
washington street
72:35
uh at weller street there at well or
72:37
where
72:37
craigan is it or o'reilly or auto parts
72:40
is
72:41
uh carlo pitoki had the tivoli across
72:44
the street yeah from where Bill lived
72:47
his father actually bought the bar for
72:49
carlo he didn't even know he's going to
72:50
run a bar until one day he came home and
72:53
said
72:54
dad said I bought this for you but Bill
72:56
kept us abreast of of him of ray wilson
72:59
at the hideaway was always a topic
73:01
i uh bergy herger was a bartender at the
73:05
hideaway they all got mentioned said
73:07
bill
73:08
this was a society for Bill he could
73:10
mingle and say who came in and and get
73:12
these stories uh
73:14
through through the the and mario of
73:17
course at mario and john's and you know
73:19
it wasn't just the the high high caliber
73:21
uh places oh no um merv mccoy was always
73:25
in the in his stories of Petaluma high
73:29
life and and the abalone feeds that merv
73:32
would have down there when you could
73:34
just throw a spread yeah
73:36
and I enjoyed that I i
73:38
this is where we got to know two ton
73:40
tony masolitta you like what
73:43
i knew him because they were on my paper
73:45
out also
73:46
um
73:47
the area of east Petaluma that got taken
73:49
down had cavanaugh lumber which yep and
73:52
uh stutters stoddard's meat market yeah
73:55
you know you got a hot dog here
73:57
it had the wooden sidewalks that's right
73:59
you know just that was history and
74:02
and the railroad in there the Petaluma
74:04
santa rosa railroad office and he he
74:06
knew railroad people he knew oh yeah you
74:09
know and well he grew up right across
74:11
from the train station right and in the
74:14
30s when he was coming of age um there
74:17
was a lot of hobos as they were known at
74:19
that time and Bill will make a strong
74:21
distinction hobos were not bumps hobos
74:24
actually worked for a living they just
74:26
happened to hop the rails all the time
74:28
and um he would praise when I was
74:31
growing up caesar sam was a famous hobo
74:33
who came through town and sharpened
74:35
knives and and scissors and he always
74:37
came to our house and he went out back
74:39
and it kind of ticked off my dad because
74:41
he had a knife collection he was really
74:43
proud of my mother would have sister sam
74:45
sharpened him up and he was not pleased
74:47
by that but she would give him a meal
74:49
for lunch in exchange for his work and
74:52
Bill wrote about sister sam's all the
74:54
time and we all accepted scissor sam
74:56
when he was in town you kind of look
74:58
forward to say oh sister sam's here
75:00
later we found out uh the hobos marked
75:02
the curb outside your house
75:05
so they knew who to come and get a meal
75:07
from for doing whatever you know clean
75:09
your yard or whatever who are the soft
75:11
spots were in doubt but he helped he
75:13
welcomed us to all kinds of characters
75:15
that they weren't strange if they just
75:17
wandered in town and the the crazier the
75:19
better
75:20
okay now you know and and from that
75:22
segway um I would like to know more
75:25
about did desert dan exist or not
75:29
first off I i know harlan but katie
75:31
would do do you know
75:33
can you even who can give us a uh an
75:36
introduction to desert dan chris
75:38
chris is that you well you've heard of
75:40
harlem
75:41
er part of Bill's column uh
75:44
throughout was
75:46
my mailbag he would
75:48
call it his mailbag and he would refer
75:50
to letters that I received
75:53
sometimes they were questions that many
75:55
times they were items
75:57
and desert dan delaney was one who
75:59
contributed
76:01
stories
76:03
you know I don't recall
76:04
if he went places
76:06
but it was always items of
76:08
the was but was he real that was the
76:11
question we never believed that desert
76:12
dam was real and then just before we
76:14
started this today uh harlan you said
76:16
yes that he indeed was we never knew by
76:19
reading the column and i'm not sure Bill
76:22
knew who desert dan was
76:24
but i
76:25
met uh
76:26
carol
76:27
wilson
76:29
uh
76:32
her last her married name slips me um
76:34
norton
76:36
carol norton
76:37
and i've known her for years and she
76:40
told me my dad was
76:42
uh
76:43
desert dan delaney
76:45
several times and she she says I have
76:48
you know proof of that
76:50
uh carl wilson was her dad that was
76:53
desert den apparently
76:55
they lived on mckenzie over in mcdowell
76:57
village he was a prison guard
77:01
down at san quentin
77:02
and marjorie wilson was a clerk for the
77:05
city of Petaluma
77:06
and you may recall chris
77:09
there were always items that legal items
77:11
or notices and it was marjorie wilson
77:14
that would sign city clerk
77:16
so
77:17
this was this was desert dan but what
77:20
would desert dan do in the column like
77:21
how are we the audience introduced to
77:23
him
77:25
just through items you know he wrote
77:28
entire pieces that still published and a
77:30
lot of them were very factual based uh
77:33
some of them discussed the desert i
77:35
remember geology they were they were
77:37
very unusual for a Bill column I mean
77:40
like so you were thinking maybe this is
77:41
like a creative writing thing he's like
77:43
made up his character no no no no way
77:46
this was like this was like the
77:47
difference between tom gaffy writing a
77:49
column as well
77:50
and john sheehy sending a letter in his
77:52
den okay desert dan yeah chris you've
77:55
probably read it yeah I read a lot yeah
77:57
desert dance uh contributions and i
77:59
don't think Bill ever knew who he was i
78:01
just uh as part of this retrospective of
78:04
Bill for the argus courier I looked
78:06
through um
78:08
49 years of bills columns on
78:10
newspapers.com and I loved it it was it
78:13
was uh there was some hilarious things
78:15
but one of them was
78:16
uh
78:17
in one column I think this probably was
78:20
i don't remember the year but it was
78:22
maybe the 80s or
78:24
1980s but he said I just got another uh
78:27
letter from the mysterious desert dan
78:29
delaney he said his
78:31
recent letters have were postmarked from
78:33
las vegas but this one
78:36
uh that and the last one the most recent
78:39
ones were postmarked from palm springs
78:42
so he says does anyone out there in
78:44
readerland know
78:45
whether desert dan has
78:48
moved
78:49
but yeah they were they were
78:52
they were just very interesting
78:55
he treated his column like a facebook
78:57
status yeah it was yeah I think you're
78:59
exactly right he was ahead of his time
79:00
exactly yes
79:02
does anybody know where to get a good
79:04
plumber
79:06
desert dan also sounds a lot like deep
79:08
throat
79:08
right
79:09
now is it not as sexy not they didn't
79:11
know who he was after he died he was
79:14
revealed by a female relative he lived
79:16
locally I mean you know this is Bill's
79:18
uh
79:20
deep throat
79:21
you know I like that
79:22
well the other thing that Bill did is he
79:24
was a he had a radio show oh yeah yeah
79:27
uh
79:29
and in the 50s it started and he
79:31
interviewed sports figures largely
79:33
because that was he was really into
79:34
sports quite a bit and I think that was
79:36
his his uncle tom caulfield who refereed
79:39
boxing matches when he wasn't running
79:41
the stockyards and he also uh was a
79:43
rodeo judge and stuff and that's what
79:45
bill
79:46
Bill fell into boxing he did a little
79:48
rodeo work and stuff but he really got
79:49
in the sports side of it he wasn't a
79:51
gambler though from what I can tell like
79:53
most people who got into that and he had
79:55
this show but he would have local
79:57
characters on and one of my favorite who
79:59
i got to know as kid was named pop
80:00
pickle
80:02
and pop was an old woodsman and he
80:04
dressed like an old woodsman and uh on
80:06
the first time he had uh Bill had him on
80:09
the show he would ask apparently asked
80:11
uh pop questions and pop was also a bird
80:14
whistler and he would respond to the
80:16
questions with different bird calls
80:19
back to Bill
80:22
that was the interview
80:23
we need those clips somebody out there
80:25
in readerland needs to send us those
80:27
clips if they haven't and my mother took
80:28
me over when I was a little kid to pop's
80:30
house he was living out in bodega avenue
80:32
the shack at the time and
80:34
what a character and he was whistling
80:36
all the time we were there
80:40
so what about behind the scenes because
80:42
a lot of you worked with him or knew him
80:43
personally his column was squeaky clean
80:45
it was very positive but what about like
80:47
the the dish what about the gossip was
80:50
he positive behind the scenes too or
80:51
would he be interested in people's
80:53
private lives
80:54
because I mean he had to have been right
80:56
you know he would come down on sunday
80:57
afternoons
80:59
uh the story always was that he'd end up
81:01
at the phoenix it was the showcase
81:02
theater in those days he'd end up at the
81:04
theater telling me story after he'd
81:06
found his camera that he had lost the
81:08
night before somewhere in town
81:10
and I don't know I never knew if that
81:12
was true or not but you know what all
81:14
the stories he told me uh I don't think
81:16
any of them ever had a negative
81:18
connotation I think they were always
81:21
they were he was telling the story about
81:23
somebody that was a hero of his
81:25
uh which is why to me all these stories
81:28
of Petaluma were about my heroes because
81:30
uh he was the first one to turn me on to
81:32
uh Petaluma history uh him and ed
81:35
mannion and uh because ed lived right up
81:37
the street as I recalled
81:39
um but uh I don't think i'd ever heard
81:43
Bill say a crossword or a mean word
81:45
about anybody ever no well and I guess i
81:47
should expand my question I don't
81:49
necessarily mean a mean word I just mean
81:50
like hey did you hear that so and so
81:52
sleeping with helen's no no he would
81:53
never
81:54
i need never
81:56
not he he was about as
81:59
kind and g-rated as you could get now i
82:03
know
82:04
because you told me in the interview
82:06
that he told you on more than one
82:08
occasion chris that um
82:11
he did note all the dirt about all the
82:13
locals he told no he he did have
82:16
negative things to say about some people
82:17
but you'd never get him out of him
82:19
publicly yeah I mean I i remember we'd
82:21
be at events you know and he he'd say oh
82:23
that that guy's a crooked son of a
82:27
but it was it was absolutely under his
82:28
breath it would never be in his column
82:30
and he never said it out loud to anybody
82:31
that was listening yeah I i'm sure you
82:34
know dave devoto and terry hilton and
82:36
other people who knew him really well
82:38
would probably attest to this i'm sure
82:40
he spoke to them the same way i'm sure
82:41
i'm not the only one but no he did that
82:43
a lot but uh
82:45
you know he was very professional on
82:47
some level how could you not you know
82:48
you do this column
82:50
i just mean like because I think about
82:51
i'm trying to like think what life is
82:53
Bill Soberanes would be like and it's
82:54
like his column was his column but man
82:56
he knew probably everything about
82:59
everybody
83:00
you know and when you know everything
83:01
about everybody you want to share it
83:02
with your people a little bit you know
83:03
what I mean I know that he was he was a
83:05
great man and he was squeaky clean
83:07
but I think
83:09
i I think that he was a gentleman and
83:12
gentlemen do not do that yes and he
83:15
didn't dwell on that stuff anyway
83:18
his what was interesting for him was
83:20
promoting petaloma yeah exactly he
83:23
didn't care about the garbage he was it
83:25
was all about oh he did dish though and
83:27
there were people
83:29
there if you read through his column as
83:31
i have done like chris sampson has there
83:33
there are little dishy items there and
83:35
it isn't dirt on people necessarily but
83:37
people also know he traded information
83:40
people knew that they floated things if
83:41
you jim uh decided you were going to see
83:44
if you wanted to run for city council
83:46
you would put it in the Bill's column he
83:48
would run it for you say rumors are that
83:50
jim ages is considering a run for city
83:52
council that's how he got helen putnam
83:54
played him like a fiddle
83:58
and he loved it she would give him
83:59
little scraps and he would run it and he
84:01
became her biggest booster in her
84:04
campaign for mayor in 64. and beyond
84:06
that she and and so he got access to
84:09
these people too so he you know it was
84:12
an interesting uh marriage there
84:15
it it may be that I was female and
84:18
therefore you know you don't say
84:19
anything mean about anyone to a woman
84:23
so I you know it may have been different
84:25
with guys 100 well and like you say he's
84:27
a gentleman and he worked with you as
84:28
well so you three all shook your heads
84:31
no uh I mean you never heard him when
84:33
when the question was asked I don't
84:35
recall him saying a negative thing about
84:38
people but I know you know he did have
84:40
dirt on people that he could have used
84:41
but he just didn't
84:42
didn't go there
84:44
i just recall him always being kind when
84:47
we were kids and after reading about his
84:50
mother I attribute that kindness to his
84:53
upbringing his sister was just the
84:55
nicest lady you ever met and I probably
84:59
their home life was that way
85:01
except when he went out back in the barn
85:03
and spent the night
85:05
you know his mother would lock the boys
85:07
into that barn
85:09
she would actually lock him in wow of
85:11
course zoom in on that what do you mean
85:12
you'd go out in the barn and spend it
85:13
well they had a they call it a barn uh
85:16
they call it a gym or but it is a pretty
85:18
good sized barn it's still there behind
85:20
the home yeah and they would well they
85:22
had weights back there and lift you know
85:24
the bakleoni family would lift weights
85:26
and when they were kids and stuff yeah
85:28
but Bill
85:29
so the clubhouse was what they referred
85:31
it to
85:32
so they wanted to spend the night in the
85:34
clubhouse but mom didn't trust them so
85:37
she'd lock them in but the boards were
85:39
loose in the back
85:43
of course and so they did their their
85:45
pranks and they're running around or
85:46
whatever they
85:47
i only heard a couple of stories you
85:49
know like the halloween pranks and the
85:52
uh
85:53
putting the
85:54
they took a uh
85:56
a wagon apart and put it on someone's
85:58
side of their roof or on their garage
86:00
and of course the next day they offered
86:02
to help yeah wagon apart okay so like
86:05
arguably that could be vandalism it
86:06
could be classified it could be
86:08
but then they would be would help the
86:10
neighbor take it back the next day and
86:12
the neighbors knew who did it yeah and
86:14
it was small fries compared to the sort
86:16
of pranks that used to go on in the
86:18
1800s in this town on halloween I mean
86:20
if you check the yesteryear's column
86:21
you're the expert in this right well i
86:23
was I mean they used to do really
86:25
mean-spirited
86:27
stuff you know yeah and uh no i'm sure
86:30
and then well and with boxing uh I went
86:32
up on the porch one day to talk to me
86:33
all about boxing and i
86:35
i named some people I knew I don't know
86:37
if we want to name names so I won't uh
86:40
there was always reputations of tough
86:42
guys you know
86:43
and I would say what about uh joe smith
86:46
and oh he was a tough guy he was I was
86:47
tough he was he was really tough
86:49
so what about
86:51
marty he was tough guy he was he was
86:53
really really tough
86:55
and he had the exact same comments about
86:57
four different men I had mentioned
87:00
now were you a columnist at the time no
87:02
you were no I wasn't you were I was no
87:05
he was a paper boy obviously
87:07
aspiring uh historian he put me in his
87:10
column a few times if i
87:12
mentioned east Petaluma he knew
87:15
Bill liked me early on because I he knew
87:17
i loved margaret he knew that she was my
87:20
teacher and that we had a bond I have a
87:23
book at home that margaret gave me at
87:24
the end of second grade it's called
87:26
johnny and the birds it's a great that
87:29
she knew I loved to read then
87:31
and she only gave a couple of kids gifts
87:33
at the end of the school year and I got
87:35
this beautiful book
87:37
and I would share that with Bill and so
87:39
we he knew that I admired her so he
87:43
liked you know we had this mutual
87:46
admiration that way I really appreciate
87:48
this little off ramp we just took
87:50
because we all have public lives and
87:51
private lives you know and I think Bill
87:54
would share
87:55
his public life with some and with you
87:57
he'd give you a glimpse into some of his
87:59
you know
88:00
his more uh juicy thoughts on things
88:03
well you know
88:04
there's another private side of Bill
88:06
that hasn't been discussed at all and
88:08
that's the mr Bill cebranus the husband
88:11
yeah yes
88:12
you know from the first second I walked
88:14
into that house I knew that those two
88:16
were so much in love with each other
88:19
and I recognized that
88:22
jane would do anything for him
88:25
she took care of him
88:26
she fed him she bathed him
88:30
she never let me take him anywhere
88:32
without making me promise don't let him
88:34
get drunk
88:35
keep an eye on him and he never walked
88:37
out the door without her saying
88:39
billy and then she he'd go over and he'd
88:42
kiss her on the lips
88:44
i mean they're too old you know she had
88:46
osteoporosis from years of cortisone
88:49
because of her asthma
88:51
and you know he was a mess and
88:53
and yet there was this uh
88:55
i mean I i was just amazed i've been
88:57
married three times myself uh you know
88:59
i'm well aware marriage is like but i've
89:01
never seen a marriage like this before
89:03
and you know when I be at events with
89:05
people
89:06
and you know the old guys
89:09
you know he's a joke Bill was a joke
89:11
ah you know Bill oh hey all right
89:13
get Bill another drink you know big joke
89:16
they didn't know what's going on inside
89:17
his head
89:18
what was going on inside his head number
89:20
one was he loved his wife
89:22
he was incredible incredible
89:24
marriage
89:25
they were crazy about each other they
89:27
were and I think that's the most
89:28
compelling part of Bill there is yeah
89:31
first time I saw it I was I was just
89:32
amazed that it isn't at all what i
89:34
expected because I grew up seeing him
89:36
the way everybody else saw him you know
89:38
and and then I went to the house and and
89:41
she was just the nicest sweetest most
89:43
wonderful woman in the world yeah you
89:45
know what else
89:46
and it dawns on me uh
89:48
she took cues from Bill was she not the
89:51
one that started the better breathers
89:53
club yes yeah incredible that sounds
89:55
like such a Bill thing she was so caring
89:58
too yeah because she knew I had asthma
90:00
so I come over the house and she'd say
90:01
oh you know she'd ask me about it and
90:03
she'd talk to me about it I brought my
90:06
husband over the house a couple times
90:07
after Bill died we we go over and visit
90:09
with her and oh my god she was crazy
90:11
about him the two of them got along so
90:12
well
90:13
and she'd sit there and talk for hours
90:14
she
90:15
she was just like Bill she she was well
90:18
she's a better journalist than Bill
90:20
would have been that she and she always
90:22
assumed that she was the one that was
90:23
editing his call well you know this is
90:25
uh I mean I kept hearing the same thing
90:27
you know that uh his sister was writing
90:29
his columns and and no I think what was
90:31
happening was uh jane yeah uploaded on
90:35
the modem was that the device she used
90:37
yeah at one point when we got computers
90:39
initially Bill would just type it on his
90:41
typewriter and bring it in and we would
90:42
re-input it but at one point um when we
90:45
got computers
90:46
she would we required all of our
90:48
colonists to
90:50
submit their columns
90:51
online via email and so she would type
90:54
his column and uh for Bill and uh send
90:57
it in over the modem so I think that's
91:00
what people were thinking about when
91:01
they thought that somebody else wrote
91:02
his column he wrote it I don't know
91:04
maybe she cleaned up the grammar a
91:06
little bit
91:07
but he wrote it and she just sent it in
91:10
yeah I recall but
91:12
i became a stringer in 1979 with the
91:15
argus and i'd do sports that's what uh
91:18
what I did and Bill would come in into
91:21
the office and
91:23
i'm not sure the year's in there but he
91:25
would take his time mingle around
91:27
shuffle around and be and then i'd go
91:30
outside and there's jane waiting for him
91:32
just patiently
91:33
it was never a timetable I could tell
91:35
that
91:36
she was just waiting
91:38
and
91:39
whenever he was ready to come out
91:42
she was there in the car waiting in the
91:43
car yes incredibly patient and I could
91:46
see that you know
91:48
she she never she never judged her
91:49
husband she never said oh Bill
91:52
slip up your pants or put you she was
91:54
not like that at all whatever Bill was
91:56
doing was okay with her but she was
91:58
always there for him patiently patiently
92:00
waiting for him yeah well I think chris
92:02
sampson found um their first meeting
92:05
which I didn't know about because they
92:07
married late in life
92:09
yeah that's right actually um uh a
92:12
neighbor of bills uh joe morrow
92:16
i uh I contacted um
92:19
for the series of stories and he had
92:21
interviewed Bill
92:22
um shortly before he died i'm not sure
92:25
how many years and he actually wrote a
92:27
piece which he had and he shared it with
92:28
me and in that piece he said when Bill
92:30
was in the merchant marine
92:33
i know he trained on catalina island
92:37
so i'm not sure if he was there but he
92:39
according to
92:40
joe's story
92:41
Bill was on leave he went to long beach
92:44
he met this
92:47
young woman by the roller coaster and
92:49
they exchanged just first names Bill
92:52
jane
92:53
not where they lived
92:55
and that was probably
92:57
1944 something like that
93:01
Bill was
93:02
three about three and a half years older
93:04
than jane
93:05
and years later uh jane had been married
93:09
got divorced she moved up to sonoma
93:11
county now
93:12
joe wrote in the story that she moved to
93:14
Petaluma but apparently
93:16
she moved to santa rosa
93:18
and
93:19
a mutual friend said uh
93:22
Bill I want you to meet the new girl in
93:24
town
93:25
and so here they meet I don't know 20
93:27
years later
93:29
just out of
93:30
pure chance she moves to sonoma county
93:33
and Bill meets the same girl that he met
93:35
at the at the by the roller coaster
93:37
recognize each other apparently so yeah
93:40
they remembered I think they remembered
93:42
each other and it was um
93:44
i read this in jane's obituary that it
93:47
was a long courtship
93:49
and they were married in 1964. so i'm
93:51
not sure how long that courtship was but
93:54
um that was uh kind of an amazing story
93:57
about how they they met years earlier
93:59
i'm especially glad that you brought up
94:01
the behind the scenes look at their
94:03
their life because he was uh seemed to
94:05
be sort of a chaotic individual but also
94:08
a man full of energy a filled with
94:10
creativity filled with ideas and and
94:12
that can be kind of messy you know what
94:13
i mean those are oftentimes the people
94:15
that they need a strong silent supporter
94:18
so that they can go and be the fullest
94:20
version of themselves so all of the
94:22
stuff that we're talking about and
94:23
obviously it's Bill Soberanes but but his
94:25
wife is is probably a large part of his
94:27
success as well um because if he didn't
94:30
have somebody holding it down at home
94:32
and being a firm foundation
94:34
who knows what his life would have
94:35
looked like she forced him to eat
94:37
you know the man wouldn't eat
94:39
i mean you guys knew him and he hardly
94:41
ever slept he hardly ever wouldn't sleep
94:43
eat or bathe
94:45
if no i'm sorry if if jane didn't
94:48
make sure that he did yeah she made sure
94:50
that he ate she made sure that he you
94:52
know no that was we got another 40 years
94:55
out of Bill because of james that's
94:57
probably true absolutely yeah
94:59
he was like einstein you know you
95:00
wandering around talking I had a college
95:02
professor at sonoma state he was a
95:04
philosophy professor
95:05
and
95:06
he walked into the room one time you
95:08
know he had the corduroy sport coat with
95:10
the patches and the
95:12
you know the little the white beard he
95:14
looked like a
95:15
typical college professor he came
95:17
wandering into the class one day looking
95:18
just like Bill Soberanes with a bunch of
95:20
books like this and he comes wandering
95:22
and he stood there and he looked up at
95:23
the lecture hall it was filled with his
95:25
students and he said
95:26
is this my class
95:28
yeah yes oh all right so they sat down
95:30
to the lecture it's the same thing that
95:32
wasn't debrachy was it the branch was
95:34
that a professor named okay yeah I had i
95:37
had a philosophy instructor just like
95:39
that absolutely yeah phil temco no he
95:41
was uh debrachy was his name and he
95:43
would watch him so Bill sabran yeah it's
95:45
all going on up here and he's not aware
95:48
you know that there's a world around him
95:50
jane was the world that uh yeah hold on
95:52
to him made sure that he did what he had
95:54
to do well before we wind down is there
95:57
any big Bill sobranus thing that we
96:00
haven't touched on any any part of his
96:01
personality his life i'd like to mention
96:03
that uh
96:05
going through his files he always
96:07
referred to his files and he knew he had
96:10
recollections of everything in his home
96:12
files and uh
96:14
when he passed away I got to with the
96:16
museum group
96:18
i went through his basement
96:20
in the house next door to the to the uh
96:23
to their
96:24
form you know his home house
96:27
and his files consisted of cardboard
96:29
boxes that had
96:31
been just
96:33
items cluttered on a table picked up at
96:35
the corners and dropped into these boxes
96:38
and there was there was
96:40
it was fun for me because I could see
96:42
there was no order there was no he did
96:44
he knew he had these items somewhere but
96:47
he didn't know he didn't know where they
96:49
were anymore that that and it was so we
96:52
had a column of
96:55
issues of redwood rancher mixed in with
96:57
really nice photographs of of
96:59
celebrities and people and
97:02
and
97:02
uh
97:03
negatives everything was just in there
97:07
and so what's happened all that now well
97:09
they
97:11
myself and and the people from the
97:13
museum they a lot of it was was soiled
97:16
and dirty from being in there so long
97:18
and the rats would chew into some of the
97:21
boxes so
97:22
we took away whatever was preservable
97:25
and the family uh
97:27
kept that
97:28
they I think the family had an idea that
97:31
they were going to open up Bill sabranus
97:34
if not museum but some kind of showcase
97:37
with their they thought it was valuable
97:39
like this is only my own interpretation
97:42
uh that they might be able to charge for
97:44
that or something
97:45
i talked to
97:46
one of Bill's nieces and she kind of um
97:50
i I had mentioned that because i'd heard
97:51
that from you and she said oh that was
97:53
never going to happen but um but it was
97:56
it was a very Bill Soberanes-like idea
97:58
exactly it was but but uh another niece
98:00
uh allowed me uh to um
98:03
go through uh some of Bill's scrapbooks
98:05
that she has at her house and I took
98:08
photos of uh several things I i don't
98:11
know if the
98:13
45 000 photos um still exist I i went to
98:17
the museum and they have several Bill um
98:20
files there and uh during this process i
98:23
know uh harlan and katie and some of the
98:25
rest of us have
98:27
gathered a lot of bills photos and
98:31
one thing that happened
98:34
after Bill died is the late Bill
98:36
hammerman who was a called himself a
98:39
volunteer cyberknot he he set up
98:41
Petaluma's first community webpage he's
98:43
a retired he was a retired
98:46
college professor and he and some
98:49
volunteers created a Bill sobranas
98:52
website and they had volunteers type in
98:54
all of Bill's fascinating world of
98:55
people columns with the photos and it
98:58
was online it was linked to the argus
99:00
courier website for a couple of years
99:02
and the argus courier website changed
99:04
platforms a couple times it disappeared
99:07
um
99:08
but i
99:12
truck down one of the people that helped
99:13
Bill put put that on uh
99:16
online and he thought he still had it
99:18
but then I found
99:19
a cd with that website at the museum and
99:24
they allowed me to copy it so i'm hoping
99:26
that somehow we can get that back online
99:29
all this fascinating world of people
99:30
columns and the other thing i've talked
99:31
to katie about is
99:33
um sometime next couple months we'd like
99:35
to uh create a wikipedia page for Bill
99:38
and um we certainly have some good
99:41
material to start with uh we can put we
99:43
can link to this podcast we can put some
99:45
of our recent uh our argus courier
99:47
stories about Bill on there
99:49
and uh so hopefully those things can
99:50
come to fruition you know you mentioned
99:53
45 000 photographs and i've always heard
99:57
but I never had actually had it
99:58
confirmed was Bill in the guinness book
100:01
or of world records for having the most
100:03
happiest photograph with the most people
100:05
in the world is that true or knowledge
100:09
see I had heard that he had made the
100:10
guinness book of world war ii as well
100:12
who would have heard that from Bill no
100:14
doubt yeah
100:15
actually
100:16
yes that's probably true they have a
100:18
formal submission yes they do I i would
100:20
like to add that uh
100:22
i believe upstairs where he and jane
100:25
lived they had he had a more organized
100:28
file cabinet of photographs
100:31
and I don't know how many or how how
100:33
well it was organized but
100:35
we kind of had the uh
100:38
the
100:39
the down and dirty stuff
100:40
you know the the discarded thing but
100:43
there were some organization there i
100:45
don't want to create an idea that he was
100:48
all haphazard
100:50
no but I mean you know I mentioned one
100:52
right well sure and that's okay
100:54
you know what hey even even people who
100:56
are much more together than him that's
100:58
how people often keep their archives i
100:59
mean like i'm going through my
101:01
grandmother's uh photos and things and
101:03
it's a treasure trove you'll get a box
101:05
and you see like uh you know my dad's
101:07
high school graduation photo and then
101:09
you see a picture from a wedding in 1996
101:11
and then you see something from 2017 and
101:12
now we're back in 1960 again I mean that
101:14
must have been a thrill for you to go
101:16
through those documents it took us
101:17
forever because we would look at this
101:19
look at this and pull up these items
101:22
we found the nicest photograph i've ever
101:24
seen of the petal of a train depot taken
101:27
several years after it was built
101:29
probably from the top of the tivoli
101:30
hotel
101:31
and I would for you that's probably more
101:33
valuable than finding you know a piece
101:35
of gold it was it was and I would love
101:38
to see that or have have it available
101:42
somehow and I i imagine the family has
101:45
it it would be something if you guys do
101:46
the work on the wikipedia or whatever
101:48
form it makes it up that at some point
101:50
to like do a book of some kind you know
101:52
what I mean if a group of people came
101:53
together somebody with some money
101:54
somebody with some like artistic design
101:56
background somebody with a lot of time
101:58
who wants to curate it I mean because
102:00
there is a life here that could be a
102:02
coffee table book oh absolutely and
102:04
there are
102:04
there's at least seven people I know
102:06
that would like it and maybe would maybe
102:08
would buy it
102:10
john chihi do you want to mention you
102:12
wrote a wonderful piece about your
102:14
reminiscences of Bill and your your
102:16
history blog do you want to mention that
102:19
anything in particular or we've talked
102:21
about Bill about the people who want to
102:24
read it
102:25
well I was
102:27
you can process that I was going to ask
102:29
from that same column about your last uh
102:32
meeting with him
102:33
the last few years of his life the last
102:35
few months of his life
102:37
um
102:38
yeah I can speak to that a little bit i
102:40
you know one thing we were talking about
102:41
in 1970 Bill branding himself as a
102:44
peopleologist and changed his column
102:46
name to Bill sobranos rather than so
102:48
they tell me and that was a shift you
102:50
know and um what I noticed in reading
102:53
the back issues and maybe chris did too
102:55
is that in the 70s he begins
102:58
my fascinating world of people he begins
103:00
writing more about nostalgia and history
103:03
and that's where a lot of the repeat
103:05
columns come up over and over and my
103:07
insight was
103:09
i left town around that time tom was
103:11
still here but a lot of other than tom
103:13
gaffey a lot of his informants cut
103:15
either died or just aged out and the
103:18
town had really changed dramatically
103:20
from where it was in the 50s and 60s and
103:22
so he was looking back more than looking
103:25
forward uh at that point and that's how
103:27
he sort of rode out the end of his life
103:29
and I came back to town in the in the
103:32
mid 90s and i'd go over to see him on
103:34
the porch where he sat on his uh house
103:37
next to the door house he'd grown up in
103:39
with his typewriter and my mother and i
103:41
would meet with him and stuff and it was
103:43
just like I remembered as a kid because
103:45
my family would have cocktail parties
103:47
and my sister and I be sent to bed
103:49
and out in my father who was a former
103:51
bartender at gillardy's built his own uh
103:54
bar in the living room in the dining
103:56
room so everybody was out there um
103:59
your your grandfather jim ages my
104:01
father's best friend everyone's party
104:03
but the voice you could hear when I was
104:05
lying at night was Bill cerbanis
104:08
like a machine gun just going on you
104:10
couldn't fall asleep because there's
104:12
Bill out there to be music and stuff
104:14
people talking but
104:16
and I remember just going over there to
104:18
the house and we'd have these
104:19
discussions on the porch and it was just
104:21
like I was a kid he had not changed one
104:24
iota
104:25
and I still couldn't follow half of what
104:27
he was saying
104:29
and I really wondered myself if anybody
104:31
really knew Bill I mean I love the guy
104:34
but I never
104:36
even when I went there alone I never got
104:37
him to kind of and i'd talk about the
104:39
past or something with him it wasn't
104:41
like talking with an old friend it was
104:44
it was he would be asked firing
104:45
questions at me so you were doing what
104:47
now when you're back you know i'm making
104:49
notes and i'm like whoa and katie said
104:51
something very insightful about your
104:53
grandmother I said I think
104:55
having that kind of personality I don't
104:57
know if you can comment on that um i'm
105:00
can you give me a clue because i'm i'm
105:01
not picking up it's uh like a defensive
105:04
mechanism oh it was my mother
105:06
my mother was a professional interviewer
105:09
and um she was exceptionally good at her
105:12
job and
105:14
she became too good at it so she was
105:19
eventually unable to communicate in any
105:23
way other than turning to you and
105:26
interviewing you and asking you the
105:28
important questions
105:30
and it was very frustrating for me as
105:33
her daughter to
105:35
not be able to
105:37
talk to her
105:39
heart to heart anymore but she had lost
105:42
the ability to do that and I think that
105:46
that Bill bilbray that aspect of her
105:49
reminded me of that same thing in Bill
105:52
that it was surface and it was a defense
105:57
interesting because the questions he
105:59
would ask then wouldn't be
106:00
deeper probing
106:02
they would have nothing to do with him
106:04
and they were so rapid fire and there
106:06
were so many of them that you would not
106:09
concentrate on the person you were
106:12
talking to you would just answer the
106:14
questions interesting
106:16
and what what do you think the point of
106:18
those questions were do you think that
106:19
was just his way of interacting do you
106:21
think it was a defense mechanism I think
106:22
it was both yeah I think it was it was
106:25
how he felt comfortable it was a learned
106:27
habit and he had done he had done it for
106:30
so long and he was so good at it that
106:32
that was what he did when my mother
106:34
could not even remember who I was
106:36
because her dementia was so advanced she
106:39
was still
106:41
turning the the tables to others oh tell
106:44
me about you tell me about your life
106:46
that way she didn't have to think she
106:48
could just ask the questions and that
106:50
may have been the same thing with Bill
106:53
and this is one of the the truths about
106:55
journalists they flatter you
106:58
by asking you questions
107:00
and that's the way he he learned he was
107:02
a very smart man and he learned a little
107:04
bit about something
107:06
just enough that he could interview
107:08
anybody about politics about sports
107:11
whatever it was he doing just enough to
107:13
get some questions going with you and
107:14
once he got your attention he was on a
107:16
roll
107:17
and I just remember coming back and
107:19
visiting him on the porch and he started
107:21
firing those questions at me in my
107:23
career and he'd run little snippets in
107:25
the newspaper about me and my career or
107:26
something like that but we never really
107:28
had a heart-to-heart talk
107:30
and I thought that was so strange
107:35
i'd like to mention uh I went to the
107:38
last reunion of the football leg horns
107:41
up here at hermanson's hall
107:43
uh and Bill was there of course that's
107:46
the photo that ran with the
107:48
my story about him
107:50
and
107:51
he had written probably uh
107:53
everybody in that room of them when they
107:55
played with the leghorns in the
107:57
late 40s and throughout the 50s
108:00
so he everybody knew him through his
108:02
column and they knew him personally
108:04
through interaction
108:05
and
108:06
halfway through the night gene benedetti
108:08
got up and he
108:10
i have an announcement of
108:13
Bill has lost his camera
108:15
and the room erupted
108:18
you don rickles never got that kind of
108:21
response
108:23
everybody got it like you don't know if
108:24
it was a joke or but they all just
108:27
roared and you everybody had to laugh
108:30
and there his camera was on the chair of
108:32
course I think he got his camera back
108:34
every time he got about you know he
108:36
would write there would be times in his
108:38
column that he lost his camera you know
108:40
but this it was almost
108:43
staged that because he got the response
108:46
and they everybody got that joke and how
108:48
do you think Bill felt about that joke
108:50
you know I i think he rolled with it
108:52
yeah you know that was his his life he
108:55
was the center of the joke exactly he
108:57
was the center of attention and
108:58
everybody knew who he was and the
108:59
laughter was because they knew him and
109:00
he probably appreciated that they
109:02
weren't laughing at him at him at all
109:04
Bill had no illusions about what people
109:06
thought that's right Bill bill knew what
109:08
people thought of him and I don't think
109:09
he really cared he knew what he was he
109:12
knew what he wasn't but more important
109:15
to him was what he was doing
109:17
which is talking to people interviewing
109:18
people boosting Petaluma and he didn't
109:20
have a big ego I mean no he was
109:23
how many people can you think of who
109:25
have a statue
109:27
of them in their town during their
109:28
lifetime
109:30
and
109:31
when they had the testimonial dinner in
109:32
october which is his birth month today
109:34
october 19th would have been his 100th
109:36
birthday
109:38
they had the testimonial dinner at the
109:39
vets building wrist wrestling was that
109:41
weekend and they dedicated the statue
109:44
that was made by the cuban-american
109:45
sculptor rosa estebans at the corner of
109:48
washington
109:49
and the boulevard and Bill told me one
109:50
time that
109:52
he was on his beat he was walking by
109:54
there and he saw some people from out of
109:56
town looking at the statue and they said
109:58
who is this guy and he said oh I don't
110:00
know just some local guy
110:01
[Laughter]
110:07
you know
110:08
you asked john about at the ending of of
110:11
Bill's life
110:13
and i'm not sure when it was that he
110:14
fell uh he felt that's right uh
110:18
he didn't break any bones but old people
110:20
can't fall you know he's not he was pr
110:22
what is he 82 or 3 or something
110:25
so I went to see him in the convalescent
110:27
home
110:28
uh he was there a few weeks you know it
110:31
he hadn't broken any bones but he was
110:33
needed some recuperation
110:35
and his spirit
110:36
he was waiting to come home he had he
110:38
wasn't depressed yeah we never we didn't
110:41
know that he wasn't going to last long
110:43
after that
110:45
but he he had his same old Bill he was
110:48
just waiting
110:49
waiting to come home again and and
110:51
resume his life and I i I felt that
110:54
optimism in him
110:57
visiting him at the convalescent home
110:58
there it wasn't at all
111:01
a downer or negative uh and we thought
111:04
he might last
111:05
nobody knew that he
111:07
nobody knows when they're going to die
111:09
we went to see him there too and I was
111:11
so
111:11
shocked because
111:13
you know my experience my relatives so
111:15
you know my two great grandmothers they
111:16
fell down
111:17
and then they died you know they got
111:19
stuck in a facility and then they died
111:21
so I was really worried so I went
111:24
and prepared for the worst when I got
111:25
there and you're right
111:28
i thought what's he doing in here yeah
111:30
he was pill
111:31
sitting there talking I don't know when
111:32
the goddamn nurse is coming back here
111:33
yeah that's right and I thought what's
111:35
he talking about and then he was out and
111:37
i was elated and I thought oh my god
111:39
this this guy's indestructible he goes
111:42
through what I thought was going to be
111:43
this horrible crisis I was prepared for
111:45
the worst and he was out again and i
111:47
really didn't expect that he was
111:50
that he wasn't going to survive much
111:51
longer I thought he was going to last
111:52
yeah I was so surprised because you're
111:54
right that's just the way he was in
111:55
there yeah
111:59
well do we have any closing thoughts on
112:01
Bill Soberanes
112:03
i think first of all I just want to say
112:04
thank you all so much for this because i
112:06
think we really did do what we set out
112:09
to do which is like created a
112:11
just a wonderful document that
112:13
talks about how much we loved him and
112:15
how why he is mr Petaluma all right now
112:17
let's take some pictures here
112:20
you know take a picture
112:22
take take two take two
112:24
take it and take a picture
112:26
i wonder if you came down
112:28
if
112:32
would he have the smartphone and do the
112:34
selfies oh yeah absolutely oh totally
112:38
you know
112:40
he was ahead of his time in that way i
112:42
mean my god can you imagine him trying
112:44
to operate his house
112:45
[Laughter]
112:46
well what would happen was his wife
112:48
would be like operating it for him and
112:49
taking all the photos
112:51
right how do you work this goddamn thing
112:54
hold the whole thing
112:56
i'm real proud that the argus courier uh
113:00
gave him the this
113:02
the space and the
113:03
what what they did for him today
113:06
the people at the argus don't didn't
113:08
know Bill the people that are there
113:10
today now
113:11
but they know what what he meant to
113:13
Petaluma what he truly meant
113:16
and they allowed us to make our
113:18
contributions
113:20
completely and even in another issue
113:23
with with kritzel follow up on that so
113:26
yeah we were actually uh had off
113:29
we've been uh having press club meetings
113:31
uh the first friday of the month in the
113:32
back room at volpe's which obviously we
113:34
had to put on hold um during the
113:36
pandemic and we went back in there for
113:38
the first time in 15 months in may
113:42
and
113:43
i think it was david templeton the
113:44
community editor of the argus he had
113:47
done a piece
113:48
about Bill
113:49
in 2018 commemorating him on the 15th
113:53
anniversary of his death
113:55
and he said
113:57
i think we all kind of realized he said
114:00
wasn't Bill have a birthday coming up
114:02
and we kind of
114:03
looked at the dates and we said oh Bill
114:05
would be a hundred so that's kind of the
114:07
genesis of this
114:08
and uh were you at that press club
114:10
meeting katie but I think we contacted
114:12
uh you and harlan uh in the middle of
114:15
the summer and said you know let's let's
114:16
do this so uh
114:18
you know tyler sylvie the new editor of
114:20
the argus he's been there since february
114:22
and david were on board with that and uh
114:25
john jackson the sports editor who was
114:28
sportscenter at the argus in the early
114:30
70s and went away and came back
114:33
knew Bill personally he did a piece on
114:35
wrist wrestling and there's a piece on
114:37
the seance harlan's column katie wrote a
114:39
wonderful lead article last week about
114:42
Bill and there's more in the argus this
114:44
week but that's
114:45
how we
114:46
got started on the Bill centennial
114:49
stories
114:50
it's good that somebody thought and
114:51
maybe that was Bill coming down and say
114:53
hey by the way
114:55
how would that have sounded chris if
114:56
Bill just did it and you and harlan do
114:58
five billion percent
115:00
oh man I used to spend so much time on
115:02
sundays talking with him yeah I used to
115:04
be able to do him
115:05
Bill came back stronger than houdini did
115:07
yeah yeah yes he did that's right yes he
115:10
did any katie any no no harlan just said
115:14
it perfectly Bill came back stronger
115:16
than houdini did
115:20
well you guys anything final to say
115:22
before we sign off or do you feel you
115:24
you paid your tribute well i'd like to
115:26
say something upon reflection thinking
115:28
about Bill a lot just
115:30
the work that uh harlan and chris and
115:33
katie have done in the argus which has
115:35
been wonderful and bringing back some
115:37
memories
115:38
um
115:39
there's a poet named gary snyder whose
115:41
father settled here and his sister theo
115:44
lowry did a book called empty shells
115:46
which was about
115:47
the the chicken industry essentially and
115:50
she had a book signing I think
115:52
maybe in 1998 and I showed up there um
115:55
and Bill popped in
115:57
and I met gary snyder i'd met him before
116:00
and I just moved back to Petaluma after
116:02
being away for 25 years
116:04
and he said and gary snyder is an old
116:07
zen guy he said that's smart because if
116:09
you want to understand impermanence in
116:11
this life stay in one place and when i
116:14
think back on Bill now he did that and
116:16
he in my mind he was a zen master of
116:18
sorts
116:19
because he stayed in this place that he
116:21
chronicled the changes of this town and
116:23
as chris just said he was always
116:25
optimistic he was always upbeat he
116:27
wasn't lamenting what we've lost he was
116:29
always looking forward as the town
116:31
changed and transformed and
116:33
i I take just a lot of
116:36
i have a lot of pride in what he did
116:38
and I i find a lot of courage in that
116:40
you know and all of us who a lot of us
116:42
who live in town now came from other
116:45
places and whatnot and those of us like
116:47
tom and I who grew up here we've seen a
116:49
lot of changes and and we've lament them
116:51
often but
116:52
there's something about Bill's spirit
116:54
that carries on here and and I really
116:56
value it and I think about him a lot now
116:58
and how he just had that courage to look
117:00
forward always look forward you nailed
117:02
it always changed you nailed it john he
117:03
was his end master he made us proud to
117:05
live in Petaluma yes yeah boost Petaluma
117:09
[Music]
117:12
that's it
117:14
closing thoughts tom gaffey uh thank you
117:16
all for coming tonight Bill was was such
117:18
a great friend of mine
117:19
uh and uh yeah he was one of the main
117:22
reasons i've loved Petaluma
117:25
through during key points in my life he
117:27
would pop in and tell me why I love this
117:29
town
117:30
and
117:31
thank you guys for helping to keep his
117:33
spirit alive and his voice alive
117:36
particularly his voice as a matter of
117:37
fact yeah
117:39
well we all do that
117:41
you and harlow do a pretty good job too
117:42
i'm sure chris sampson can handle it we
117:44
need to thank jim and tom
117:47
thank you very much yeah we're so glad
117:48
you guys came this has been a pleasure
117:50
yeah well everybody out there who's
117:52
listening uh definitely go to
117:53
pedalman360.com a lot of articles came
117:55
out last week uh you have an article
117:56
coming out this week just eight hours
117:58
ago actually it came out
117:59
and uh once again I mean my god thank
118:02
you guys so much we could not have done
118:03
this without you and it's his 100th
118:05
birthday and now this will live online
118:09
for perhaps ever uh and the next
118:11
generation of people could maybe be
118:12
tuned into what Bill Soberanes was doing
118:14
and why we loved him and why he's
118:16
important you know so I asked john so
118:18
should we should probably do a toaster
118:19
Bill but I don't think anybody at this
118:21
table really drinks I don't know I know
118:24
so
118:26
all I can say is Bill happy birthday
118:28
happy 100th birthday
118:29
we all love you and uh thank you Bill
118:32
thank you Bill thank you Bill thank you
118:35
Bill and thank you everybody for
118:36
listening um
118:38
have a great night thanks guys thank you
118:45
[Music]