George J. Cotliar is dead: The former managing editor of the LA Times was 94
George J. Cotliar, who served as managing editor of the LA Times for 19 years during his 40-year career at the newspaper, has died.
Cotliar’s daughter, Sharon Cotliar-Zweifach, confirmed that Cotliar died in her sleep early Monday morning at her home in Newport Beach. He was 94 years old.
“Our father’s first love was journalism, and since he was a wonderful, dedicated father, we were very aware that we were growing up with a newspaper man,” Cotliar-Zweifach told The Times on Wednesday. “He set a high standard in terms of honesty, integrity and treating people with respect. We understood that was the way he worked – in his work and with his colleagues and with us.”
George Cotliar was born on Jan. 16, 1932, in the Bronx, born to Russian immigrants. When he was 5, his family moved to Los Angeles and settled in what he liked to joke about was “the slums of Beverly Hills.” He attended Beverly Hills High School, Los Angeles City College and, finally, Cal State Los Angeles, where he earned a degree in journalism.
After working at a variety of local papers in Los Angeles, Cotliar caught wind of The Times opening. He took a $13-a-week paycheck to get his foot in the door and one step closer to the goal he set for himself while working the newspaper route at age 11: running the Los Angeles Times.
He was hired as a reporter for the Westside section and was promoted a year later to editor of The Times’ suburban section; after another year, he took on the role of copy editor before becoming chief copy editor and special sections editor for the paper. He worked assignments in the Metro and national departments, spent two years as managing editor of the Times’ Orange County edition, and after 21 years of juggling multiple roles at the paper, assumed the title he’d worked for since grade school: managing editor.
Under his watch, the paper’s installation won 10 Pulitzer Prizes and many other awards.
“He was a terrific manager who was dedicated to the paper’s readers, especially the way the paper presented stories on Page 1,” former Times National Editor Roger Smith said Tuesday. “He was always striving for the best stories and the best balance every day, and when I say every day, I mean every day. He was an LA guy. He knew the city and he knew the region.”
As infamous as Cotliar was for his accurate election-night calls, impressive memory, dedication to journalism and love of college basketball and the Los Angeles Times, he was also known in the media for his almost-occasional temper tantrums. Whether it was calling the mayor an “a—” when he thought he was hanging up or hitting the return key on his typewriter so hard it went flying, there was never a dull moment when Cotliar was at the helm.
LA Times Managing Editor George Cotliar, right, greets King Hussein of Jordan in the lobby of the newspaper building in downtown Los Angeles in the 1980s. Robert W. Gibson, editor of The Times’ Foreign section, is seen in the background.
(Los Angeles Times)
Cotliar married Pearl Ruth Gottlieb on Aug. 24, 1958. Died December 2011.
She is survived by her son, David Cotliar, and her partner, Kenneth Wang; her daughter, Sharon Cotliar-Zweifach, and her partner, Dr. Eric Zweifach; and two grandchildren, Abigail Zweifach-Coles and Joshua Zweifach.
