Barney Brantingham, a great journalist who embodied Santa Barbara the way Mike Royko did Chicago, Jimmy Breslin New York, and Herb Caen San Francisco, died last week, his family announced Monday. He was 93.
Like those big-city newspaper brethren of his era, Barney captured the human stories, sentiments, and spirit of his town, pounding out a real-time history of Santa Barbara on deadline, day after day, year after year, in his must-read “Off the Beat” column.
In lovely send-offs, Jean Yamamura and Josh Molina both detailed his life and long career as what used to be called a “newspaperman,” in their obituaries in the Independent and over at Noozhawk, respectively. Please check them out.