The Law Offices of Cobb & Cole

The impact of a single life is impossible judge. But the impact made by Thomas T. Cobb's lifetime of service is community is undeniable.

Tracing that impact means revisiting pivotal moments over he past 50 years of local history, and asking how things might have been different.

Would the corrupt old guard who ran Volusia politics through the 1940s have stayed in power longer? Cobb was at the center of a bank of reformers who challenged the unscrupulous political machine in DeLand and Daytona Beach, fighting an establishment that turned a blind eye to illegal gambling, vote fraud and other problems. Maybe the reformers would have fought just as hard without Cobb in the fray. But maybe not.

Would Volusia County have become one of the first success stories of local charter government? Over the past decades, Volusia has been a leader in many areas - children's health care and environmental protection among them. Those innovations sprang from the county's unique governing structure, which Cobb helped draft - giving voters the ability to set priorities and direct their elected officials in ways unheard of in other parts of the state. Maybe later leaders who followed Cobb would have been as bold and as far-seeing. But maybe not.

Would Daytona International Speedway have been built? In his account of the negotiations with Bill France Sr., Cobb talked about the conflict raging between those who thought France was getting a "sweetheart deal" in being allowed to lease public land for an as as-yet-unproven sport. Yet Cobb was convinced that France was prepared to walk away from Daytona Beach if he didn’t get a favorable deal. He made sure that didn't happen. Maybe the negotiations would have ended just as successfully with someone else at the table. But maybe not. In the coming days, as people gather to talk about Cobb and mourn his death Thursday, these are the kinds of stories they will tell --- and there are dozens more. In each instance, it's difficult to say "Without Tom Cobb, this never would have happened." But put them all together, and the pattern of contributions - and foresight - is clear.

He could compromise, but never on issues of principle. He was loyal, but that loyalty didn’t prevent him from speaking out when he thought something was wrong. One of his last pieces written for The News-Journal decried the city's eager expansion of Spring Break, and its short-sighted failure to expand off-beach parking and remove cars from the beach. These positions don't sound radical today. But the article appeared Feb. 5, 1994. It was late in Cobb's own career. But this community's leaders have only recently come to realize that in this, as many other areas, Cobb was right. This is the kind of influence that can't be qualified, through the list of his accomplishments – his 10 years as state lawmaker, his influence as city attorney, his ardent representation of clients like Bethune-Cookman College, his leadership of a law firm that grew from a one-man outfit to statewide prominence, his advocacy for the elderly and disabled - is indeed long. And it is impossible to write, about Cobb on these pages without acknowledging his abiding contribution as legal adviser to this newspaper in its success as the sole remaining family-owned daily paper in Florida.

His guidance will be felt, and his vision missed, for a long time to come.