Listen: Remembering Tom Robbins—’Blue Collar Journalist’
By Bob Hennelly
Tom Robbins.
WBAI Pacifica Radio was graced for several years with the on-air presence of Tom Robbins, a fearless reporter who did stories about working people and their challenges getting by in a city and nation that increasingly served the rich.
His death last week at 76, reportedly from a 9/11 WTC cancer, was a profound loss but his voice and humor endure in the many episodes he did of “Deadline NYC: Tales of New York from a Veteran Reporter.”
Whether it be the mob muscling in on a union, or a predatory landlord exploiting tenants, Tom pursued the story "without fear or favor."
He came to news reporting, not through the rarefied air of journalism school but via jobs as a cab driver and community organizer.
There's been comprehensive obituaries in the City Limits, New York Times, The City and the Daily News, recounting Tom's illustrious career that included writing for those outlets and the Village Voice.
He understood the potential power of collective action and an informed population.
"Tom Robbins was a champion for working New Yorkers as both a journalist and union member," said Vinnie Alvarez, president of New York City's Central Labor Council that represents more than one million workers from 300 unions. "His decades of prolific journalism at news outlets that sought out truthful stories of their struggles has left New York City a better place."
It was Reggie Johnson, who was Tom's WBAI producer and on air engineer, who summed it up best. He described Tom as "a blue collar journalist" as opposed to today's aspiring journalists who spend six figures to get an academic credential, and in the process "meld their way into the status quo."
"He was the voice of the people," Reggie said during a live broadcast introducing Tom's last show. He was in the tradition of journalists "who stood their ground representing the people like Jack Newfield, Jimmy Breslin, Wayne Barrett, and Gabe Pressman did."
During his last broadcast on March 24, Tom gave his listeners a brilliant and concise appraisal of where we are before turning his show over to his granddaughter and nieces for an episode of free form radio we are known for.
"Enough with the unbearable news about the attacks on the Constitution, the savaging of the aid agencies, the winnowing of Social Security, the firings at the tax collection agency at the IRS, the call for impeachment for the judges who are doing their jobs to try and enforce the law, condemning the Ukranians who are just trying to defend their country," Tom declared.
Tom's signature opening to “Deadline NYC,” was an excerpt from the 1952 classic movie Deadline USA, which starred Humphrey Bogart as a muckraking newspaper editor exposing a gangster who threatens Bogart for publishing an expose cataloging the mobster's crimes.
In that 'black and white' America there was still hope for our democracy "as long as one newspaper" would "print the truth."
We are right now in the middle of the Trump's 2.0 chapter and it's an open question as to whether or not that notion can endure.
Tom's left it to us to make sure it does.
Listen to the entire show below: