A long-time financial contributor to jazz radio station KKJZ, Richard Goad met jazz disc jockey Helen Borgers while volunteering at the station during a membership drive several years ago. Borgers is also the Artistic Director of the Long Beach Shakespeare Company (LBSC), another non-profit organization. After her air shift one day, Borgers explained that she had to rush to make a yard sale the theatre company was having in order to raise the money to pay the rent on their building. The following day, Goad inquired as to the yard sale’s outcome. Finding the company $300.00 short of their goal, Goad generously paid the difference, explaining that he believed that the company was providing a great service to the community by promoting literacy and producing classic plays.

Since then, he has become the patron saint of LBSC, sponsoring shows, building community awareness by touting the company to his friends and associates, and, at the beginning of this year, providing them with a major unrestricted donation, enabling them to make building improvements, buy much-needed equipment, and meet other operational expenses.

In appreciation of his many contributions to the theatre company and his continued good will in the community, the Long Beach Shakespeare Company renamed its Black Box Theatre on Friday, February 10th, at 5pm. The new Richard Goad Theatre, at 4250 Atlantic, Ste 2, in Bixby Knolls, will become one of the dramatic and cultural centers in Long Beach.

Goad made his first entrance in Dunbar, West Virginia in 1944. He studied physics at MIT, resulting in 28 years as an engineer and scientist at Hughes in southern California. Now retired, he has become the number one volunteer at KKJZ, where in eight years he has logged in over 900 volunteer hours. He is also the only lifetime member of the public-supported radio station. Jazz is his passion, but he is committed to serving his community by promoting literacy and sponsoring the LBSC.

announcing the
Richard Goad Theatre:
The new home of the
Long Beach Shakespeare Company

Richard Goad and Macbeth (Brian Koehler) at the reception on February 10th, 2006 on which day we officially re-opened with our new name: The Richard Goad Theatre.