It was impossible to resist Bob Maxson when he came up to you with that huge smile of his, said your name in his Arkansas drawl and told you to “Go Beach!”
That was the unique signature greeting of Maxson, who brought Cal State Long Beach into national prominence when he was president of the university from 1994 to 2006. Maxson became the fifth president after Curtis McCray retired in 1994.
Maxson’s smile and hearty greeting was stilled when he died Sept. 22 at his home in Anacortes in the San Juan Islands near Seattle, Washington. He was 89. Maxson fell at his home and had to be hospitalized, where he developed pneumonia. He returned home, where he died, according to his daughter, Kimberly Maxson-Rushton, an attorney in Las Vegas.
Cal State Long Beach will forever be with him as he was buried, at his request, in his favorite black CSULB sweater with the words “Go Beach” stitched on, his daughter said.
“My father just loved Long Beach — the university, especially the students, faculty and administrators — and the community,” Maxson-Rushton said.
She said a decision on a memorial celebration was pending.
When Maxson left Long Beach in 2006, he wrote in a statement: “I take The Beach with me wherever I go, in-state or out.”
“When I travel, I proudly wear a cap or a shirt that lets people know where I’m from — The Beach,” he wrote. “I am not a graduate of this university, though I might as well be. My love for this campus and its wonderful people runs deep, and I like to show that to the world! I love this place!”
Misty May, star player on the 1998 women’s volleyball championship team, and CSULB President Robert Maxson. (Courtesy of the Maxson family)
In 2002, Stephen Spielberg finally earned his degree from CSULB in a special ceremony with university President Robert Maxson. (Courtesy of the Maxson family)
In an undated photo, then President Bill Clinton, left, and then Long Beach Mayor Beverly O’Neill, center, are greeted by CSULB President Robert Maxson. (Courtesy of the Maxson family)
In 1994, CSULB President Robert Maxson walks the campus with a can of his favorite beverage, Diet Coke, greeting students. He had an uncanny ability to remember everyone’s names. (Courtesy of CSULB)
In an undated photo, former CSULB President Robert Maxson and his wife, Sylvia, stand on Maxson Plaza on the CSULB campus, which was named in their honor. (Courtesy of CSULB)
Columnist Rich Archbold, left, and Bob Maxson attend a reception before the 2001 Grand Prix of Long Beach. (Photo courtesy of Rich Archbold)
In 1994, CSULB President Robert Maxson, with his arms around two students on the left, and then student body President Robert Garcia, right, promote the Beach nickname. (Courtesy of CSULB)
Brian Gimmillaro, coach of the 1998 women’s volleyball championship team, and CSULB President Bob Maxson celebrate the team’s victory. (Courtesy of Rich Archbold)
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Misty May, star player on the 1998 women’s volleyball championship team, and CSULB President Robert Maxson. (Courtesy of the Maxson family)
An outpouring of accolades and remembrances followed the news of Maxson’s death.
Rep. Robert Garcia, a former mayor of Long Beach, was president of the student body at Cal State Long Beach when Maxson was president there.
“Bob Maxson was the best mentor I’ve ever had,” Garcia, D-Long Beach, told me. “His impact on students and the university is unmatched.”
Garcia said he and Maxson had remained friends.
“He continued to give me great advice and his thoughts on the country and the world,” Garcia said. “We spoke just a few months ago. I’m so grateful for his leadership and kindness. Go Beach.”
Jane Conoley, who has just retired after 11 years as CSULB president, said Maxson was “super positive about students and the campus and started the trajectory that took the university from a regional university to a national one. He got people to be really proud of the school, and he worked to attract the best of the best students to attend here.”
In 2014, Maxson had returned to the campus to introduce Garcia, then the new Long Beach mayor who was making his first major policy speech on education.
In her opening remarks at the event, Conoley, who was just in her fourth day as the university’s newest president, brought a smile to Maxson’s face when she said: “Stand back, Harvard and Yale. The Beach is now in the room!”
Andrew Jones, the current CSULB interim president while the university is looking for a permanent successor to Conoley, said in a statement that Maxson’s loss was a personal one for many of the staff and faculty who worked at the university.
“I worked with Bob in my role as university counsel, and I was delighted to hear from him again, just a couple of weeks ago, when he reached out,” Jones said, “as gracious and enthusiastic as ever, to offer his congratulations and support as I began my new role.”
Jones also reminded everyone that it was Maxson “who came up with ‘The Beach’ and ‘Go Beach’ — terms that forever changed how people on and beyond campus think and talk about our university.”
When Maxson arrived in Long Beach, he discovered that the name of the university here was a mouthful, with some favoring California State University, Long Beach, or Cal State Long Beach, with many in the sports community favoring Long Beach State University.
Maxson felt like something more succinct would work better. He discovered that the word — “beach” — was not used in the names of any major universities, so, he reasoned, why not call CSULB “The Beach”? He worked to put “The Beach” and “Go Beach” on as many locations on campus, including the bottom of the swimming pool and as high as the water tower by the VA hospital. It caught on with sports teams and spread throughout the community.
“I think the nickname has a special draw,” he said.
He also would talk about how the nickname made students feel better about themselves, “kind of like a big hug.”
“Go Beach became sort of a cheer,” he said once, “but it expanded beyond the sports programs. It was an attitude and was more than a sports cheer.”
Maxson was also famous for his almost magical way to remember names.
Marcelle Epley, now CEO of the Long Beach Community Foundation, told me the story of her first accidental meeting with Maxson when she was a beginning student at CSULB.
“I had my face planted in my schedule in front of the bookstore when I heard this booming Southern accent voice coming from behind a man with a large smile,” Epley recalled. “It was President Maxson making his rounds on campus, shouting at me, ‘Hey, Marcelle! Make it a great first day!’ How he knew my name that day has me still wondering 25 years later.
“As I got to know him, until I received his gripping handshake at graduation, I realized he loved students and the entire campus,” she added. “He was exactly where he wanted to be.”
In earlier interviews, Maxson told me that he worked at remembering names, knowing how important names were to people.
“One thing I would do,” he said, “is repeat someone’s name over and over in my mind after I met them so I would be better able to remember it later.”
Maxson’s achievements were many, Jone said, but perhaps the most significant and transformative were his efforts to make student success the central strategic goal of the university.
“He made a lasting and singular impact,” Jones said, “and it is no exaggeration to say that his optimism and exuberance have helped to define our campus character.”
In 1995, Maxson started the President’s Scholars Program to provide full tuition, fees, books, campus housing and other benefits to high school valedictorians and National Merit scholars. As Maxson hoped, the program attracted many outstanding students.
Maxson was the first California State University president to receive the California State Student Association’s University President of the Year Award. Those wins became so frequent that student leaders eventually retired his name from consideration and renamed their award the Robert C. Maxson President of the Year Award in his honor, Jones said.
Maxson also had just started as CSULB president when the Pyramid, now called the Mike and Arline Walter Pyramid, opened, a multimillion-dollar sporting arena rising 18 stories high and seating 5,000. Also, in 1994, CSULB officially opened the Richard and Karen Carpenter Performing Arts Center.
These different initiatives changed the reputation of CSULB of being a commuter and heavily part-time student school, Maxson said.
Maxson was an optimistic, positive person who liked to talk about how he worked at “watering the green spots,” looking for ways to support programs and projects that were doing well but needed more support.
As a sports enthusiast, Maxson also spent a lot of time cheering on all the Long Beach State teams, including the 1998 women’s volleyball team, coached by Brian Gimmillaro, that was undefeated and won the national championship. The star of the team was Misty May — who went on to win Olympic gold medals.
Dan Gooch, a longtime officer with the Long Beach Century Club, the city’s premier sports club, remembered when students put a photo of Maxson on 1,000 ping-pong paddles and brought them out to surprise Maxson at a game at the Pyramid.
“He loved telling students to support their sports teams,” Gooch said. “He said if they did, he would sit with them for the first half of games and then sit with his wife for the second half. He was always looking for ways to help students.”
Maxson is the only person in the history of the Century Club to be named an honorary member because of his support of sports, Gooch said.
Another highlight during Maxson’s tenure was giving a degree to one-time student and successful movie director Stephen Spielberg in 2002. The university accepted Spielberg’s award winning film, “Schindler’s List,” as meeting the film school degree requirements for graduation.
Maxson was born Robert Clinton Maxson in 1936 in Watson, Arkansas. His mother was a school teacher, and his father worked for the railroad in an engineering position.
He began his career as a high school English teacher before receiving his doctorate and going into higher education, where he spent 28 years as a university president, serving at the University of Houston-Victoria, the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and Cal State Long Beach.
After he left Long Beach, he and his wife, Sylvia Parrish Maxson, moved to the small town of Anacortes in the San Juan Islands in Washington. But he was lured out of retirement when he accepted the position as president of Sierra Nevada College, a small liberal arts school in Incline Village, Nevada, from 2007 to 2010.
After returning to Anacortes with his wife, Maxson won election to the school board there.
“My father loved his wife so deeply,” his daughter said. “They were married for 60 years before she passed away in 2023 after suffering from cancer. My father was buried next to my mother. Their tombstone has the sweetest words etched. On my mother’s side, it reads, “Sylvia Loves Bobby.” On my father’s side, the etching reads, “Bobby Loves Sylvia.”
Sylvia Maxson was also a highly regarded educator. She retired as a professor of early childhood education at CSULB and was a strong supporter of the university, and its students and programs. She founded the Reading Institute there.
The Maxson Plaza at CSULB is named after the couple. They have two children — Kimberly Maxson-Rushton in Las Vegas and Todd Maxson, a pediatric surgeon in Arkansas — and five grandchildren.
Maxson’s daughter said the final days with her father were bittersweet and beautiful at the same time.
“We held hands and talked about many things — his love for his wife and family, his love of sports, his love of life. He was totally lucid,” she said. “Losing your father is not easy, but I couldn’t imagine a better way of saying goodbye.”
Go Beach!