By Barbara Falconer Newhall
I worked at the Oakland Tribune for years, but, working stiff that I was, I was never invited to the lofty heights of the Oakland Tribune Tower. I finally got my chance on April 4, the last day of my paper’s publication, to take the elevator all the way to the top and take in the view — the bay, the East Bay hills, the sometimes sleek, sometimes fanciful architecture produced in Oakland over the past 100 years. Young, old, graceful, awkward, the buildings of the East Bay sparkled in the April sunshine.
The Tribune Tower, designed by Edward T. Foulkes and erected in 1923 at the behest of Oakland Tribune publisher Joseph R. Knowland, no longer houses the Tribune. The paper was absorbed on April 5 by the Bay Area News Group’s East Bay Times. But the tower remains the symbol of the city of Oakland.
The 22-story brick structure is in much better shape than when I worked there as a feature writer and columnist back in the ’80s. That fact hit home when I took the elevator to the top of the building along with dozens of other former Trib employees who’d come together to mourn the Tribune’s last day of publication.
The occasion was gloomy, but the photo op was lit by a cloudless sky. These pictures are the result.
More about the wake for our old newspaper at “The Trib Is Dead, Long Live the Tribbers.” More about life after newspapering at “My First Royalty Check Has Arrived — How Cool Is That?”
Nice work, Barbara. It was a sad, but great day. The thing I remember most about the days on the 20th floor was WFK mixing martinis with Beefeater’s in a huge pitcher. At one endorsing session, Virgil Meibert casually lit a cigarette (you remember smoking, don’t you?), then casually flipping his match toward a wastebasket. It landed in Frank Finney’s glass. Lunches were catered by Trader Vic’s.
gayle
Ha! Yes, I remember smoking. I also remember a lot of drinking, but it was at the Chronicle in the 1970s. On opera opening night there, Vic’s would cater late night snacks for us on the features desk. No alcohol. We had to work fast and get everybody’s name right.