Friends of the Downey Library have a party and Dave Lopez is the present

On Sunday the volunteers Friends of the Downey City Library met for the annual Voluteer Holiday Celebration.

Librarian Claudia Dailey baked special cookies and brownies and Christmas delights, and we munched on those and sandwich wraps at festive tables spread out the open reading room, showing the versatility of the newly designed Library’s multi-use space. The library is otherwise closed on Sundays.

President of Volunteers Virginia Yoshiyama was there, and Ramie, in charge of the Gently Used Book Store in the Library Lobby, and Elsa, her mother, enjoyed the spread. Sue the Treasurer of the Friends wore antlers, and another sported a black and red checked long woolen gown and matching hat. Some many faces I knew but not names. Mary Stevens, a bookstore volunteer, was there, as well as my friend of the splendid head wraps, Ethyl. Today Ethyl wore a warm red knit cap to keep warm on a blustery afternoon after a cold night of rain.

Downey High School volunteers Coty, Livingstone, Samuel and Caleb. (Photo by Lorine Parks)

Student volunteers from Downey High filled several tables. They walk across Brookshire to assist in the store and the work room, and “to help Claudia.” That means they’re busy, because Claudia wears several hats, among them her special love, the Children’s Library Room. Claudia is also Adult Literacy Coordinator. Teaching adults to read is a long-term commitment.

Claudia had a holiday present for us, speaker Dave Lopez, the news and sportscaster from Channel 2, recently retired after 48 years, looking back on his lifetime here. Dave has a history with Downey: he and his family bought a home here and Dave coached his son’s football team with Downey’s Gray-Y and then DJAA; his two kids loved to read in this Library. Wife Elaine Ekberg Lopez starred as an outstanding elementary teacher in the DUSD.

Sportscaster or newscaster? Dave started out with the Huntington Park Sentinel, wanting to be a sportscaster, moving up to doing stories on Bubbles the Hippo and Clarence the Lion. He noticed that the sports arena was being taken over by former greats on the field and the diamond. Then his editor in San Diego told him, “I’m going to make a newsman out of you.”

“That was a good choice,” said Dave. “I learned to get it quick and be succinct. Then came cable and TV, and the transition was easy, from writing in print to telling the story live.”

One of the first things you notice talking with Dave is his smooth resonant voice.

“Early on, I knew I had a command presence,” said Dave. “I was never shy, and I loved to be inquisitive. And I love storytelling.” All the prerequisites for the award-winning journalist that Dave became.

“Being prepared with the facts before you meet your subject, is how you meet deadlines,” said Dave. “And listen to the answers to your questions.

“Speaking Spanish helped.” Dave was an early bi-lingual reporter.

“I was with the same company, CBS, and channel 9, that CBS bought in the 90’s, for 48 years” said Dave. “That’s unheard of today. But I started in the golden age of TV, and I worked with all the greats: Jim Murray, Bill Stout and legendary Hal Fishman. George Putnam took me to lunch and said, ‘Dave, there’s just one little thing I want you to change, your nose.’ But George, I said, “I like my nose.”

“In my 48 years,” said Dave, “there wasn’t a story I wasn’t part of. One, the O.J. Simpson story, I missed the freeway car chase because I was on jury duty and the foreman would not excuse me. But the next day I was there, in court for the entire proceedings. I used my contacts to get an exclusive interview with detective Mark Fuhrman.”

Retired journalist Dave Lopez spoke at the Friends of the Downey City Library’s holiday lunch on Sunday. (Photo by Lorine Parks)

“The story that made my name”, said Dave, “was William Bonin the Freeway Killer. Bonin’s mother lived in Downey and after the excitement died down, I went around to her house and interviewed her privately. Bonin didn’t want the death penalty, and because of my kindness toward his mother, Bonin chose me to confess to, on the air. He was executed by the state anyway, convicted of 24 known deaths. He confessed to more, and that was a tragedy for all the families involved. Downeyites may remember the last victim was a teenage boy who lived in Downy all his life.

“The only story I missed was in 2013 when a brilliant rogue cop named Christopher Dorner went on a killing spree. The District Attorney, judges, they were his targets, and all of Los Angeles County was terrified where he would strike next. But my wife Elaine was dying in an ICU in Long Beach,” said Dave, “and I was at her side.”

Dave has written all this down in the book he has written since retiring two years ago, “It’s a Great Life If You Don’t Weaken.”

“I had a collaborator,” said Dave, “and we tried three different publishing houses, and they all wanted me to leave out some of the personal parts. I said no, that’s what I’m trying to do, to capture what it was living here and growing up in the 50’s and 60. For example, my family’s South Gate 2-bedroom house cost $7,500 in 1955.

“So we decided to self-publish. And 80% of the proceeds from the price of the book go to a foundation I have established for a scholarship in Elaine my wife’s name. So far the foundation has given over $125,000.

“It’s a special kind of scholarship, for a special need.” said Dave, “For a student enrolled at HTPA, Harbor Teacher Preparation Academy, in Wilmington. HTPA is a school where students can simultaneously earn a high school diploma and an Associated of Arts degree. HTPA’s program is designed for at-risk/highly capable students, and to address the teacher shortage in the Local District 8. Each scholarship is worth $12,000.”

“It’s been a wonderful way to live,” said Dave. “I traveled the world, met presidents and key people. But the business has changed dramatically. You always had to show up and to be there in person, but now there’s Zoom, internet, long distance stuff. With COVID,” said Dave, “you stand in the next room behind a door to get a story, or do it remote.”

“The world is changing and the attention span now goes by so quick,” said Dave. “I’m a dinosaur. I believe you should look your best, wear a suit and tie. One editor told me it was like being invited as a guest into someone’s life. Dress up for it.”

“I’ve had a great run,” said Dave. “And I would not trade it. But it was time when they offered me a buyout. And now I love retirement. No schedule.”

“The only thing I would change,” said Dave, “would be if I could save my mother’s suffering from Alzheimer’s. I have experienced death with loved ones, and there is a kind of survivor’s guilt. Fortunately, in my career I have gotten helpful words of wisdom. Once I interviewed a man whose family had been killed in a fiery automobile accident. I said to him, ‘You are remarkably composed and able to talk to me.’ And he said, ‘You never put a question mark where God has put a period.’

For Dave Lopez, retirement in Long Beach is a comma, and the next big story.