Ryan submitted a new blog post: The Childhood Home Of Tom Cobbs Continue reading the Original Blog Post
Think about that place in 1930. Really sit with it. Think about Tom’s family standing there then. His old man barreled west trying to outrun the ghosts of his family’s sins back in Virginia, determined to be his own man, albeit financed by a fortune that had more than a little blood baked into it. They bounced around a handful of West Coast homes before finally planting a flag in this one. Tom grew up drowning in privilege. The kind of privilege so thick you could cut it with a knife. He never had to work a single day in his life if he didn’t feel like it, and neither would his kids, or their kids after them. The runway was endless. And yet, instead of parking himself on a terrace with a drink in his hand and watching the Pacific roll in and out like a screensaver, he packed up and went to university in Arizona, then doubled down with an engineering degree. He could have slid comfortably into oil, finance, or some corporate nonsense designing widgets for people he didn’t respect. Instead, he aimed his intellect straight at hoodlumism, speed, and hot rodding. You have to remember, when Tom Cobbs first plunged into hot rodding, the whole thing was still widely viewed as criminal behavior. Godless delinquents, public nuisances, men with no respect for laws or polite society. To willingly step out of extreme privilege and into that world is astonishing to me. And then there’s the poetry of it all. Blower technology, fuel injection, real advances in speed science, all being pushed forward under the roof of what amounted to a multi million dollar shed, led by a twenty something rich kid who absolutely did not need to be there. The contrast is ****ing awesome.
I'm actually gonna write a letter to the new owners and include that shot from their backyard... At the very least, they should know what happened in their garage. Edit: I've been trying to figure out a way to post this without do**ing someone or giving up some private ****.... But the previous owner I got the letter from is the former CEO of Warner Brothers... And he bought the property from Matt Damon. I have no idea who the current owner is yet... and I'm not gonna make any strides to figure it out. Instead, I'm just gonna get out my type writer, type up a nice letter, and see how it goes. Worked the first time anyway...
@Ryan the contrast is there. I had not heard of Tom before your blogs. I am thankful for the education and knowledge that has been shared and that he do***ented so well. However, with hindsight blurred by time, the Bentley Boys and other gentleman racers of the previous generation were also flirting on the wild side. Another example might be Zachary Taylor Reynolds. While all mentioned tended not to get into the guts of a motor or ***embling a whole new idea like Tom, there is still a precedent for the monied to have a p***ion for motorsport. BTW, the property is beautiful.
Ryan, these side, or back stories always intrigue me and pull me in. I had ran across the Tom Cobbs name several times while perusing some of my old little books, but never really knew much about him until you brought his story to us all. Thanks for adding yet another facet to it all. I’m anxious to see where this all goes.
Very cool. I love that not even the shrubs have changed all that much. I’ve been down similar rabbit holes lately in Kansas City with a horde of photos from the 1920’s and earlier. It’s amazing how much is largely unchanged. This weekend I found a bridge built in 1902 and I kid you not even the telephone poles are in the exact same spot as they were in 1902. cool to see something stay put while everything around it changes.
" Jeeves, young master Tom has left grease stains in the porte-cochere again. Give the maid a cup of solvent, and have her see to it."
This drifts into something genuinely interesting if you let it, and it wanders straight into the soft underbelly of the American Dream and whatever came after it. Today, if you live on a street like that, you just ***ume you’re surrounded by ******** money, hedge fund refugees, or tech people who hit the slot machine at the right moment. End of story. But back then it was different. Tom was lighting off hot rods in that driveway starting around 1946, still a kid, rattling the windows and the nerves of polite society. He was working out of that garage clear through the early fifties, maybe ’53, ’54, ’55. And the context matters. American wealth had been beaten ****** by the Great Depression, with only the deepest, most entrenched family fortunes surviving intact (Tom's being one of the fortunate). World War II didn’t help either. Most industries were still clawing their way back. Stack the New Deal and the Great Compression on top of that and you end up with a country where the income gap narrowed dramatically between 1930 and 1950. Because of that, it’s likely the Palisades wasn’t some frozen museum of aristocracy yet. It was probably full of new money. New industrialists, inventors, businessmen who had an idea, took a risk, and hit. The raw, unrefined version of the American Dream... So I like to imagine Tom’s neighbors standing there, drink in hand, rooting him on as he revved the latest monster in the driveway, hammering away on a dyno he got from Stu Hilborn, watching the future scream itself into existence instead of calling the cops. I’m not one of those guys who straps on rose colored gl***es and pretends the past was some golden paradise. I don’t wish I lived back then, and I sure as hell don’t want to rewind the clock. But there is one thing about that era that gnaws at me, and that’s how real the American Dream actually was. After the war, it was sitting right there in the open, something you could actually reach out and grab. Since then it’s gone off a cliff, but for a brief window, it was real.
Now that a bit more of the personal history of Tom Cobbs has surfaced via the digging by @Ryan, one has to be truly amazed, at how the money didn't spoil Tom Cobbs. He figured it out early in his life, he knew had a privileged status, via his family's money, and he didn't let it sway his path, or go to his head! He took the high road, and went to school, got smarter, and then took the path of the hot rods and all that it entails or has or had to offer, and lets face it, he did it extremely well ! We are all truly blessed, that via this web site ( H.A.M.B. ) and Ryan's persistence and good luck, that we have these archives to look at, and the intense multi varied topics that Tom decided to photograph, during those time's that he was at all of those cool kick *** events! Confidence is high, that what ever letter Ryan composes next, to the owners and their contacts, no doubt a cool do***entary will eventually happen! Thanks from Dennis.
I love these journey's into back stories & the like, I have also been surprised - though I shouldn't be - at how many times Cobbs has turned up in articles about hot rodding from the 50/60's in TRJ & elsewhere. Thankyou for opening our eyes such things
My Dad and I were just talking about this a couple of weeks ago and we have discussed it many times before. Hot rodding grabs a hold of people from all walks of life, Fame, Money, Poverty doesn't matter when it comes to being stung by the hot rod bug! I have personally sit at a small taco table with Friends that I have made in the hot rod world that could Buy my whole neighborhood at retail value, Then sell it at a 50% loss and still never lose a night's sleep. When we come together with our hot rods, We are all equal! Only real difference is they have more toys and more rare speed equipment than me
Nice pad, I think I could make it work. I'd never heard of Tom Cobbs until Ryan's posts began, I've been really enjoying and soaking up every bit of it. Honestly now though, learning of the wealth is a slight buzzkill for me. All along I've been envisioning a greasy s**** more so than a silver one. But yeah, at least for us the dude picked the right hobby and had great ambition.
I have to disagree @WAYNE WILLEY , wealth should have nothing to do with how one conducts themselves, what really matters is acting as if everyone is an equal regardless of financial worth. Tom Cobbs chose hot rodding to focus on and along the way he helped others make some significant developments in the speed equipment industry.
Agree…. And let’s not forget, there’s a real possibility So-Cal Speedshop doesn’t exist if it were not for financial help from Tom’s dad. The fact that Tom was born with a silver s**** in his mouth makes his crazy work effort all the more impressive to me.., and makes the story interesting as hell.
We all love an underdog rising up, especially here in Australia. So I can understand that, It is also great to see when - as been said - someone with means gets out & contributes & though he was everywhere man, his name wasn't in the spot light, almost as if he didn't want the praise or attention. Untill @Ryan rained on his parade & told the (HAMB) world about it!
As a tool junkie, I'd sure like to see photos of the inside of that garage...I wonder what his workbench and tool box looked like. Given his location I'm guessing he used Plomb tools, since they were manufactured in LA.
Interesting stuff Ryan, thanks! Some more context .... https://www.hotrod.com/news/tom-cobbs-record-player
Right, like I said, "But yeah, at least for us the dude picked the right hobby and had great ambition." I didn't say or mean to imply that the "silver s****" was a bad thing. All I meant by "slight buzzkill" was that in the back of my mind while following all of the stories here it's not how I had imagined things, until that info came to light. Again, I never heard of Tom Cobbs until Ryan started feeding us these stories and info. With that being said I also never knew of the SoCal connection either. So yeah, sounds like we're all fortunate that Tom chose the paths he did.
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