Banjo Bob at the Farmers Market

Bob Loomis, aka "Ukelele Bob," found himself transformed last Thursday, due to technical difficulties, to "Banjo Bob." Playing a solo gig in the sun as part of the Farmers Market on Court Street, Loomis ruminated on the irony of the moment.

"I used to work in the Sharkey Building right behind me," he said. Those were the days whent the building housed the offices and presses of the Contra Costa News Gazette, in what is called the Sharkey Building (also known as 630 Court St.). Loomis noted that in those days, the press room guys generally kept "a fifth of something in the pocket of their aprons."Of course, the reporters and editors did, as well.

Loomis said that in those days (the mid 1960s), reporters at the Gazette did a little of everything - they went out and got the stories, came back and wrote them, perhaps edited them as well, and then helped with the layout of the paper. Ask his modern-day cohorts at the Martinez News Gazette today, and you'll find that very little has changed.

Loomis went on to have a distinguished career in various Bay Area publications, including the Vallejo Times Herald, the Oakland Tribune (where we worked together for several years), and the Contra Costa Times.

He is now retired, and says he doesn't miss the "good old days" at all. He spends his time now exercising, hiking, and playing music in various bands. He also performs the occasional solo gig, as he will this Thursday, June 2, again at the Court Street Farmers Market.

Be sure to drop a buck in his bucket, and tell him Martinez Patch sent you.