A Tribute

A good family friend has died, and while he was a giant in this town and more well-known figures will weigh in on his passing, I want to contribute in my own small way.

First, the story on the street:

Entrepreneur, civic leader Tobman dies at 81

Herb Tobman, sporting an ever-beaming smile and offering a lighthearted joke on almost any subject, would hold court daily in the early 1990s at his Mr. T's Diner at 2129 Industrial Road.

Tobman, president of the Stardust hotel in the 1970s and owner of Western Cab Co. since 1968, would regale customers with his stories about working as a teenage bellhop in the Catskill Mountain resorts or of his early days in 1950s Las Vegas when he was a gas station attendant and star softball player.

"Herb Tobman was the king of Damon Runyun characters in a town of thousands of Damon Runyun characters," said Bill Shranko, director of operations of Yellow Checker Star Cab Co., and a friend for more than 25 years.

Tobman, who served on the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority board in the 1980s and became a multimillionaire by buying and selling Las Vegas real estate for half a century, died Tuesday in Las Vegas of a heart attack, his family said. He was 81.

Services for the Las Vegas resident of 54 years will be 1 p.m. Friday at Palm Mortuary-Main Street, followed by a graveside service at Woodlawn Cemetery.

Tobman served a term on the Clark County Planning Commission and was appointed to the Las Vegas City Recreation Advisory Board after it was created, serving one year as chairman.

"Herb had a sense of humor for every situation - lighthearted or serious," Shranko said. "With a joke he'd make something serious seem lighthearted."

Former Clark County Commissioner Manny Cortez, a longtime president of the LVCVA, said Tobman "was one of the better thinkers" on the LVCVA board.

"Herb understood the big picture - he cut to the chase and got to what was important," Cortez said. "In the early 1980s, there were a lot of differences of opinion about the value of conventions. A lot of casino operators were mostly interested in visitors but not necessarily conventioneers. Herb understood the significance of convention business.

Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he was a youngster when he first met Tobman at the old downtown Squires Park ballfield where Tobman was a shortstop/catcher on the nationally respected Horseshoe Club fast-pitch softball team. The team featured Reid's brother, the late Dale Reid.

"Herb has been my friend just about all of my life," Reid said. "His personality was so strong. He was like a ballplayer who always kept up the chatter during the game. He was always talking it up for Las Vegas."

Tobman's son-in-law, prominent Las Vegas attorney John Moran Jr., said: "Men like Herb Tobman don't come along every day, and that's sad."

In 1974 Tobman was appointed president of the Stardust hotel. In the late 1970s, Tobman and his friend, the late Al Sachs, formed Trans-Sterling Inc., and continued to run that Strip resort as well as the downtown Fremont and Sundance hotels. They sold their interests in those properties in 1984.

Two years later, Tobman ran for governor on a ticket that included establishing a state lottery and toughening drug laws to include life in prison without the possibility of parole for those convicted of selling narcotics to minors.

Tobman raised $90,000 for that campaign, limiting donations to no more than $10 per contributor.

Born Dec. 20, 1924, in the Bronx, N.Y., Tobman joined the Navy in 1942 and served aboard the destroyer U.S.S. MacKenzie during World War II.

After the war, Tobman played semi-professional basketball with the New York Gothams and, after obtaining an $1,800 loan under the G.I. Bill, bought a New Jersey service station and a Long Island, N.Y., dry cleaners.

In 1952 Tobman sold those businesses and moved to Las Vegas, where he initially lived in an 8th Street boarding house while working as a service station attendant.

Soon after, he took out a $1,200 bank loan to open City Furniture Exchange. In 1955, after that store burned down, Tobman became general manager of the Moulin Rouge on Bonanza Road, the city's first integrated casino. Tobman also rebuilt his furniture store, which served Las Vegas for 20 years.

In 1971 Tobman was hired as general manager of the Aladdin Hotel, where he instituted a champagne dinner buffet.

Tobman was a licensed pilot. He owned at various times different models of Cherokee airplanes and recently bought a Beech King Air. However, when he turned 78, Tobman hired a co-pilot to fly with him.

Tobman also served as a chief deputy coroner and as a trustee for the Culinary Workers and Bartenders Pension Fund. He served 12 years with the Southern Nevada Officials Association, refereeing high school and college basketball games in the 1960s and '70s.

Tobman's civic deeds included serving as chairman of the Clark County Heart Fund, a member of the Elks and breakfast Optimists clubs, commander of the local Jewish War Veterans chapter and as a member of Temple Beth Sholom. He also was a co-founder of WestCare, a Las Vegas drug rehabilitation center.

An accomplished handball player in New York, Tobman took up racquetball in Las Vegas and won numerous tournaments, including the 1984 West Coast senior doubles championship.

Tobman is survived by his wife of 58 years, Jean Tobman; three daughters, Janie Moore, Marilyn Moran and Helen Martin; nine grandchildren; and a great-grandson, all of Las Vegas.

The family said donations can be made to WestCare Foundation, 900 Grier Drive, Las Vegas, NV 89119.

My grandmother worked for Mr T. as a seamstress at the resurrected City Furniture on Main Street when she came to town in the mid-sixties. My uncle, not even old enough to drive, would ride shotgun with Lightning. They'd go around town in a truck, picking up discarded furniture so they could refurbish it at the store and sell it.

My mother has worked for Mr. Tobman for 33 years. First as an upholsterer and later as the manager of his cab company.

When I was thirteen, I started working there in the summers or after school, helping out in the office or washing cabs. The year he ran for governor I helped hand-paint his campaign signs.

But none of these were just work relationships. The thing about Mr. T is that once you fell in under his wing, you were part of his family, and my family always felt that way. His daughters are my mother's friends. His wife is a graceful, compassionate, strong woman who we've always admired.

And none of this gets closer to the truth of how much this man was loved by us.

How can I possibly explain the hundreds of times over the years where a little conversation always got right to the root of what mattered to him most: "how are you? Really? Is there anything you need from me?"

Yet he had known tragedies no man should have to endure. He'd buried parents, siblings, friends, his only son and a grandson. But none of this hardened him. His only response was to become more tender, and more giving.

Mr. T. took in strays – not stray animals, stray people. Some would have said he was being taken advantage of, but he never saw it that way. Where he thought he could help, he would. Some did take advantage, but that never hardened his heart, either.

Over the years, the papers would report his quiet donations to homeless dinners or destitute families. And for every report that trickled out, there were at least ten instances where nobody noticed. Nobody but those he touched. If a family lost everything in a fire, he was there. If a patriarch died, he made sure the children would be okay. There are other instances that shine in my mind, but to write about them would violate those private, silent agreements: "take this, just between us."

It was his way, which was also the Old Vegas way. He is Old Vegas to me, with all the ways it used to be here – all the old places, the old signs, the roads and homes that have been plowed over to make room for what we are now. He is intertwined with all the sights and sounds of my childhood.

This city has lost something we can never get back. His spirit, his no-nonsense approach, his straight talk. And his heart.

Maybe this very personal story can explain better. My grandmother died with a terrifying suddenness January 9, 2004. Within two days, Las Vegas native (and giant) Judge Myron Leavitt died. Their funerals were on the same day, at the same time. Mr. Tobman was chosen to be a pallbearer at the Judge's funeral, so we understood that he wouldn't be at my grandmother's much smaller goodbye.

I stood at the door of the chapel, greeting people, when he walked up with his wife Jean. Nothing that day had made me cry. Until then. I remember saying "I thought you'd be at Judge Leavitt's." He replied, "I wouldn't miss my chance to say goodbye to my friend Mae." I don't think truly understood his heart before that day.

I keep coming back to that, because his heart was larger than life. And in the end, it finally gave out.

Tomorrow, Mr. T., I won't miss my chance to say goodbye to you.