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Articles by Ed Leibowitz
Golden State innovation, ASU roots
Editor's note: This story was featured in the summer 2026 issue of ASU Thrive. Story by Ed Leibowitz For ASU graduates, California has long been a place to build careers — and scale them. From the Bay Area to San Diego, Sun Devils are shaping industries across the state. Here are three alumni making an outsized impact.
How Merle Haggard and Buck Owens Built the Bakersfield Sound
The camera pans across the gray-blue haze of San Francisco Bay, sails above the bleak topography of San Quentin, and settles on Merle Haggard and his band as they trudge through one of the prison’s entry gates, its thick iron bars flung open for them. “This is South Block, boys,” Haggard says in the 1971 video footage. “I spent 18 months in that son of a bitch.” Over a decade prior, Haggard was in the audience when Johnny Cash played a New Year’s show at San Quentin.
Bakersfield Sound: Grit, Spit, and Greatness
Coroner unable to determine cause of death of woman whose body was found in June A 63-year-old Bakersfield woman found dead the morning of June 29 has been identified by the Kern County coroner’s office, but there was no word on …
Final Curtain
By the time of JFK’s inauguration, Humphrey Bogart, Carole Lombard, Jean Harlow and Errol Flynn had already joined the ranks of celebrities interred across Forest Lawn – Glendale’s 300 rolling acres; Rudolph Valentino, Tyrone Power and Douglas Fairbanks Sr. were among the leading men buried within the 62-acre confines of Hollywood Memorial Park (since renamed and immortalized in song as Hollywood Forever Cemetery).
Walking Westwood
Your typical college town tends to start out small and grow steadily over time, as its founding institution expands in enrollment, influence and the sheer size of its footprint. Not so Westwood Village. Its creators weren’t interested in modest beginnings or slow accretions over time. By the time they debuted their master plan for the district in December 1927, the storied Janss family had already developed more than 100,000 acres in California, from Van Nuys to Monterey Park to Yorba Linda.
Stratocaster: California’s Stradivarius
Rock ’n’ roll was born during the summer of 1954—in two delivery rooms. As Elvis recorded his first songs at Sun Studios in Memphis, a middle-aged radio repairman turned instrument maker was in his workshop in Fullerton, California, putting the finishing touches on a guitar he’d named the Stratocaster. Within a dozen years, this masterpiece would cement Clarence Leonidas Fender’s reputation as the Antonio Stradivari of rock.
Sea Ranch Chapel: Tiny House of the Spirits
Undulating, nearly levitating atop a bluff near the Sonoma coast, the Sea Ranch Chapel reveals itself as a shape-shifter. Made of cedar, redwood, stone, and stained glass, this wee house of worship is a fairy-tale mash-up, a seeming creature of the surf and wind, a coming together of elements real and imagined. Open 365 days a year, the nondenominational chapel overlooks 53 acres of residential enlightenment.
An Experiment in New Cuyama
From onetime gold rush mining towns along Highway 49 to the vineyards of wine country, California overflows with inspired examples of how the human profit motive can make a natural landscape just that much more picturesque. Then there are regions like the Cuyama Valley. The area is nothing if not beautifully situated, nestled just east of the Sierra Madre, with the Bitter Creek National Wildlife Refuge to the east and the Los Padres National Forest just south.
Shh! Secret Testing Grounds
AERONAUTICS: JETTING INTO HISTORY BOOKS Since the 1970s, the Mojave Air & Space Port has hosted some of the world’s most groundbreaking experimental aircraft, from the Rutan Voyager (in 1986, it became the first craft to circumnavigate Earth without stopping or refueling) to SpaceShipOne (which, nearly 20 years later, in 2004, embarked on the first privately funded human spaceflight).
Gustavo Dudamel Wants to Take Classical Music Off Its Pedestal
Gustavo Dudamel has been lured back onto the stage for his second encore. It’s Oct. 9, opening night of the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s 2022–23 season. As the crowd spots the conductor, the volume inside the Walt Disney Concert Hall surges. He acknowledges the accolades, steps onto the podium, tilts his head back, lifts his arms, and hurls himself forward like a battering ram as the orchestra explodes into the first note of the Star Wars theme.
How Matt Mochary became the preeminent tech-world CEO coach
By Ed Leibowitz long Read There’s something Silicon Valley’s most indispensable CEO coach must get off his chest. “At times,” says Matt Mochary, “I realize that I’m a fraud.” In the last decade, Mochary has built a career on guiding a good percentage of the tech industry’s youngest and most prominent CEOs toward being better managers, feeling more comfortable in the role, and even achieving professional joy.
Schwarzenegger Left Legacy of Broken Promises
As Arnold Schwarzenegger steps down this month, California voters can only marvel that a leader of such apparent strength is leaving the Golden State such a weakling—its institutions eroded and its finances more of a mess than when he took over from Gray Davis after the 2003 recall.
The Show Did Go On
When the pandemic erupted last year, many California theater companies and music organizations responded initially with shock, followed by a headfirst plunge into the virtual. “I’ll never forget the week of March 9th,” recalls Jennifer Bielstein, executive director of San Francisco’s American Conservatory Theater (A.C.T.).
In a Galaxy Closer to Home
Rancho Obi-Wan founder Steve Sansweet with a cast of thousands. The Darth Vader head on the back wall once greeted Toys “R” Us shoppers in Times Square, while Darth Malgus (left) is a seven-foot, $5,999.99 limited-edition action figure (long sold out, alas).
Aprons That Make a Splash
Step into Hedley & Bennett’s headquarters in the industrial town of Vernon, in southeast Los Angeles, for the first time and you may mistake the place for a kid’s gym gearing up for a six-year-old’s birthday party. There’s a tree house, a sinuous slide, and awesome, free ice cream. But walk farther inside and you’ll see a wildly successful chefs’ wear company in full swing. About 20 workers are bent over their sewing machines, stitching together denim aprons.
The First Couple of Twang
In the hinterlands east of San Diego, in a nondescript building hemmed in by a CVS pharmacy and the Martin Luther King Jr. Freeway, Greg and Janet Deering produce more than half of all the banjos made in the United States. Béla Fleck, arguably the world’s most celebrated living banjo virtuoso, plays a Deering, as do Keith Urban, Winston Marshall of Mumford & Sons, and Emily Robison of the Dixie Chicks. Recording artists who favor Deerings have piled up dozens of Grammy awards.
The Last Days of Foie Gras
It is Saturday evening at Mélisse, a Michelin two-star French restaurant in Santa Monica, and the chef, Josiah Citrin, has spent most of the past five hours engaged in what will soon be punishable offenses: poaching grossly enlarged duck liver to accompany a filet of Dover sole, folding grossly enlarged duck liver into agnolotti, whipping grossly enlarged duck liver into a mousse that will rest on a substratum of blood-orange gelée.
The Solitary Existence of L.A.'s Mall Mastermind
On a Saturday night, CityWalk may be the most vital public space in Los Angeles. Marooned atop Universal City, these three blocks lead to nowhere, but they’re bustling, electric, alive. The Roman temples, the midget deco skyscrapers, the corrugated warehouses, the vintage neon Pontiac signs, the blue King Kong, the giant surfboards—it’s as if all of L.A.’s architecture, real and imagined, were thrown into a blender and someone flicked the switch.
10,000 Laid-off Workers Later, Sam’s Club “Transforms” Its Business
Last October a representative of the Walmart Foundation headlined a workshop entitled “The Just Transition” at a conference focused on corporate responsibility in Huntington Beach, California. Julie Gehrki, the foundation’s vice president of programs, was optimistic about the future of a retail workforce that faces automation and has been beset by store closures.
Tim O’Reilly Eyes the Future of the Tech Industry By Peering Into the Past
On January 22 President Trump announced that the U.S. would impose a 30 percent tariff on solar technology imported from China and most other countries. The tariff won’t boost domestic solar manufacturing, but it will inflict damage on America’s 374,000-job solar industry, which for the last eight years has thrived on inexpensive imports. How much damage depends on who’s talking. The Solar Energy Industries Association, or SEIA, says the impact will be devastating.
Union Staffers: Time's Up, L.A. Times
It’s a Monday evening in a University of California, Los Angeles lecture room, and multidisciplinary artist Dan Froot has brought together an ensemble of actors and musician/composer Robert Een to preview his upcoming show Pang! — which will be staged in Los Angeles for two performances this weekend.
How Billie Jean King Picked Her Outfit for the Battle of the Sexes Match
In the days leading up to Billie Jean King's monumental confrontation with self-proclaimed male chauvinist pig Bobby Riggs, the American public was spared few details about their $100,000, winner-take-all "Battle of the Sexes" tennis match, which took place September 20, 1973. Newspaper readers knew that the 29-year-old King was wolfing down 3 Musketeers bars and vitamin E, while Riggs, 55, was devouring fistfuls of vitamins and bushels of avocados.
The Dreamer: How Developer Tom Gilmore’s Wild Idea Launched the Downtown Loft Craze
For their senior project on downtown Los Angeles, the Buckley School’s class of 2004 have been treated to a taste of life after graduation as they would like it to be. Just yesterday, the 58 students of the elite San Fernando Valley academy descended on the city’s historic core. They strolled through streets of once-dead office buildings—lovingly restored and remade into the most compelling urban neighborhood L.A. has spawned since the late 1800s.
How The Internet Fueled The Rise In Hate Crimes In California | Fast Company | The Future Of Business
In late February of 2016, the Loyal White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan decided to hold a “White Lives Matter” rally at a public park a couple of miles north of Disneyland. By all accounts, the rally seemed less a show of force than a last gasp—with the entire white supremacist contingent spilling out of a single SUV. By the time the time the Klansmen arrived at the park, they were far outnumbered by about 50 mostly peaceful counter-demonstrators.
The golden state of hate: how the Internet made hate respectable
In late February of 2016, the Loyal White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan decided to hold a “White Lives Matter” rally at a public park a couple of miles north of Disneyland. By all reports, the rally seemed less a show of force than a last gasp — with the entire white supremacist contingent spilling out of a single SUV. By the time the time the Klansmen arrived at the park, they were far outnumbered by about 50 mostly peaceful counter-demonstrators.
The <em>L.A. Times</em> Responded to Our Investigation Into Its Dysfunction
Since Los Angeles magazine published my article “What’s the Matter With the L.A. Times?” we’ve heard from many readers, including many current and former staffers at the paper whom I had not interviewed for the piece. Overwhelmingly, these editors and reporters described feeling gratitude that the kind of misguided leadership and personal attacks that they and their colleagues have suffered in editor/publisher Davan Maharaj’s newsroom had been finally brought to light.
George Takei on How to Live Longer and Prosper
Every morning I do 100 push-ups and 50 sit-ups and work out with free weights while I watch the news. No, that’s not incredible. If you do it regularly, it’s quite credible. You exercise sufficiently and get enough sleep—six to eight hours, they tell you—and keep the mind engaged. These are the laws of longevity. You look at a marathon, and you say, “Oh, my God! 26.2 miles—who’s going to run that?” And yes, it’s not easy.
What's the Matter with the L.A. Times? Los Angeles Magazine
By the time Scott Glover set his sights on the nation’s prescription drug abuse epidemic, he had already proved himself to be one of the most talented investigative journalists in the Los Angeles Times newsroom. His instinct for identifying betrayals of the public trust—and the resourcefulness with which he went after those responsible—had led to some of the paper’s biggest scoops.
What’s the Matter with the <em>L.A. Times</em>?
On September 4, 2015, Scott Glover tweeted: “Feeling incredibly grateful today for 18 amazing years at @latimes and for a new opportunity and very warm welcome at @CNN. Thanks to all.” Glover’s decision to leave came as a surprise—even to Girion and Ryan. He told them and other colleagues that he had planned to stay at the Times until he retired, said one source, but that Maharaj’s mismanagement of the OxyContin series had proved too much (Glover was 49 at the time).
The Name of the Game: Forrest Lucas
Editor’s Note: This article appeared in the January 2007 issue, after the Indianapolis Colts announced Lucas Oil had secured the naming rights to the team’s new stadium. According to recent reports, Forrest Lucas is on President-elect Donald Trump’s shortlist for U.S. Secretary of the Interior. If ever the Colts needed their full cheerleading squad on the field, it’s now.
The Rise and Fall of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger
Editor’s Note: This article originally was published in 2011 in Los Angeles Magazine. As Arnold Schwarzenegger steps down this month, California voters can only marvel that a leader of such apparent strength is leaving the Golden State such a weakling—its institutions eroded and its finances more of a mess than when he took over from Gray Davis after the 2003 recall.
Latino. Pro-Trump. Discuss.
On the final night of the Republican National Convention, Jorge Herrera arrives in blue scrubs at the Elephant Bar in Torrance and orders an ahi salad and a margarita. Donald Trump has already concluded perhaps the darkest presidential acceptance speech in his party’s history—evoking an America bilked by trade deals, overrun by illegal immigrant criminals, and menaced by terrorists.
American Way, Celebrated Living, Nexos
Not for the first time during this Tuesday-morning walk through her sleepy San Fernando Valley neighborhood, Demi Lovato feels the backward tug of the leash and turns to face the inevitable. “Oh, Batman,” the 23-year-old pop star says, her soft brown eyes fixed on a jet-black hairball squatting in the middle of the sidewalk on his tiny haunches. “Oh my God. Sorry.
The Tao of Panda Express
Peggy wears her hair in a tidy bob. Her soft eyes beneath faint brows take you in gently, not piercingly. She’s short and slender, which makes the diamond engagement ring she’s wearing look even larger than it is. Her two-piece suit is elegant but in a way that doesn’t scream its designer bona fides.
Where Does the Grim Sleeper Rank Among Notorious L.A. Criminals?
On Wednesday, jurors in the so-called Grim Sleeper trial began deliberations to decide whether Lonnie Franklin Jr., who was arrested in 2010, is or is not a serial killer. Franklin, now 63, faces 10 counts of murder in the killings of nine women and a 15-year-old girl—a series of slayings that began in the mid-1980s. He also faces one count of attempted murder. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.
Find the Whiskey Club That's Right For You
: The region’s most exclusive scotch and bourbon club is presided over by Adam Herz, screenwriter of American Pie. About 32 upwardly mobile professionals, Hollywood types, and spirits bloggers. The rest of us are out of luck. No newbies—unless perhaps you bring a $94,000 bottle of Glenfiddich Janet Sheed Roberts Reserve. Founded by Orthodox Jews, the group now includes men and women of all religious persuasions who worship single malt.
The 5 Best Places to Buy Whiskey in L.A.
Beverage Warehouse 4935 McConnell Ave., Del Rey This institution features the best of the current American microdistillery boom, plus a deep inventory of the more storied houses of Scotland, Tennessee, and Kentucky. K&L Wine Merchants 1400 Vine St., Hollywood There’s a sense of adventure and risk at K&L—especially evident in the series of exclusive bourbons, ryes, and scotches bottled under its Faultline label. The brand’s blended scotch is a masterpiece of peat, smoke, and extreme thrift.
5 Best Places to Buy Whiskey
Beverage Warehouse 4935 McConnell Ave., Del Rey This institution features the best of the current American microdistillery boom, plus a deep inventory of the more storied houses of Scotland, Tennessee, and Kentucky. K&L Wine Merchants 1400 Vine St., Hollywood There’s a sense of adventure and risk at K&L—especially evident in the series of exclusive bourbons, ryes, and scotches bottled under its Faultline label. The brand’s blended scotch is a masterpiece of peat smoke and extreme thrift. .
Meet Chris Uhde, the First Name in L.A. Whiskey
To begin tonight’s tasting, Chris Uhde (pronounced “OOH-dee”) grabs a half-full bottle of Old Lewis Hunter rye. The label is so ragged, it looks as if it’s been salvaged from the wreck of the RMS Lusitania, and indeed Uhde dates this whiskey to about 1917, pre-Prohibition. “I want to teach you about ‘old bottle effect,’ ” he says.
9 Types of Whiskey You Need to Know Now
1. One Great Shining Barrel When a bottle of whiskey is the product of one distillery, chances are it still contains a mixture of multiple barrels whose unique personalities are sacrificed to achieve a consistent nose and flavor year after year. They can be less predictable, but single-cask scotches or single-barrel whiskeys—like Booker’s bourbon—give those personalities total creative expression. 2. Et Tu, Quinoa? American craft distillers are experimenting with alternative grains.
5 Best Bars to Get Your Whiskey Fix
Bar Jackalope 515 W. 7th St., 2nd fl, Downtown A semisecret door inside Seven Grand opens onto L.A.’s most intimate whiskey bar, which holds about 20 imbibers watched over by a phalanx of taxidermied rabbit heads that have sprouted antlers. Japanese whisky is a specialty. “When I think about whiskey, it’s like I’m analyzing music,” says bartender Linh Do of Bar Jackalope, whose tasting notes might refer to Thomas Pynchon or Tupac Shakur.
Will Melodrama Sink American Crime Story: The People Vs. O.J. Simpson?
Whether the O.J. Simpson murder trial was a travesty of justice or justice served is still debated 20 years later. In terms of TV ratings, though, the proceedings were an indisputable triumph, fueled by such theatrical cheese as prosecutor Marcia Clark’s fashion makeover and lead defense attorney Johnnie Cochran’s ode to a bloody Isotoner glove (“If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit”). Which is why we’re worried that FX’s American Crime Story: The People v.
Can the New 6th Street Viaduct Help Transform L.A.?
This year it’s out with the old as demolition begins today on one of the city’s icons, the 6th Street Viaduct. Since 1932, the bridge has joined Boyle Heights with the eastern reaches of downtown across the Los Angeles River; it’s also served as a dystopian stage in a Terminator sequel and Fear the Walking Dead. A chemical reaction has weakened the viaduct’s concrete supports, turning it into a seismic hazard.
Bruce Dern on Killing John Wayne and Crossing L.A. on Foot
My people thought I was going to the University of Pennsylvania to get an education, but I was there mostly to run. When I tried out for the 1956 Olympics, I didn’t just miss the cut—I missed it totally. I was good enough for the Ivy League but I wasn’t worldwide good. So in 1957, I quit college and started looking for something to do. I moved to New York and was with the Actors Studio for two and a half years. Then Lee Strasberg and Elia Kazan deemed that it was time for me to go to California.
Lisa Edelstein on Cocaine Lines, Riot Bonding, and the Art of Growing Up
In New York I was a club kid, and my experience was all about other people. But when I came out to L.A. in 1991, I became very socially isolated. There was a different social language here, and I couldn’t figure it out. Nowadays everybody’s on the same page almost instantaneously because we’re all on the Internet, but back then the social language of cities was different.
American Way, Celebrated Living, Nexos
Before he sprinted up those 72 stone steps in Philly to perform his fist-pumping dance, before he guzzled a raw egg, took his first jab at a beef carcass or uttered his first “Yo Adrian,” Sylvester Stallone painted Rocky Balboa as an elderly man. Finding Rocky dates back to 1975. At the time, Stallone had sold his screenplay and had even held out to get himself cast as the Italian Stallion, the lovable lug of a has-been boxer who somehow gets a shot at the heavyweight title.
Brie Larson on Ghostly Manses, Impromptu Dances, and Unexpected Awe
I have a problem with not recognizing famous people. Up until a few years ago, I used to DJ to make money, bringing my vinyl to a Nylon magazine party or a Coachella party, going into this weird other world. The night of the 2009 Grammy Awards, around the time we started shooting Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, this DJ friend of mine invited me to an after-party in the Hollywood Hills. Around midnight I showed up to a crazy, over-the-top mansion with lots of marble.
L.A. Watch Collectors
Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills styles itself as the intersection of luxury, fashion, and entertainment—a tourist mecca where well-heeled shoppers flock to make five- or six-figure impulse buys. For a select group of L.A. watch collectors, proximity to this exclusive retail district means having one of the world’s great timepiece capitals in their own backyard.
TV Glut Benefits Paul Reiser, Other Semi-Retired Actors
Paul Reiser still looks like Paul Reiser. The curly pompadour from his Mad About You days has receded to a rough thatch of steel wool, but his voice has lost none of its nasal tone, and he remains physically fit, even by Hollywood standards.
Committee of One
On a gloomy winter afternoon, Los Angeles’s most powerful civic leader and richest man sprints his way through the Museo Guggenheim in Bilbao, Spain, just as the day before he sped through the Museo del Prado in Madrid, hurtling past centuries of Spanish art. Here, deep inside the Guggenheim, the Jasper Johnses, the Andy Warhols, and the Roy Lichtensteins he rushes by don’t claim his attention for more than 40 seconds. Why should they?
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