Countdown to Don the Beachcomber biography begins with fundraiser, early special edition

Updated Feb. 22

Much has been revealed in recent years about Donn Beach (aka Don the Beachcomber), considered to be the godfather of 20th century Tiki culture. But we still don’t have a complete picture of the life and times of the enigmatic bootlegger-turned-restaurateur, who opened the first faux Polynesian bar in the 1930s and influenced countless imitators. That’s all about to change.
Preview the book below: Images and sample pages | Video
Bonus cocktail recipe: Beachcomber’s Silver

Years in the making, the 208-page biography Searching for Don the Beachcomber will hit bookshelves in 2026, researched and written by Tiki historian Tim “Swanky” Glazner and published by London-based Korero Press. The hardcover book is due to be shipped April, and fans jumped at the chance to secure a special edition via a Kickstarter campaign that launched Jan. 20. More than $45,000 was raised in the first a week, smashing all goals. The total when the campaign ended was more than $60,000 (£45,230).

Early backers received several special rewards, including first-edition copies with an exclusive signed bookplate. A limited-edition mug by Eekum Bookum featuring Beach’s signature cannibal carvings sold out fast, and a second batch with a different glaze was added. The mug and book are now available for pre-order via the official website, along with 8×10 prints of Beach.

Glazner is co-founder of The Hukilau in the early 2000s and author of Mai-Kai: History and Mystery of the Iconic Tiki Restaurant (2016, Schiffer). It was during the research for that book that he starting uncovering fascinating facts and stories about the man who started life in 1907 as a Texan named Ernest Gantt and ended in 1989 in Honolulu as a lifelong supporter of authentic South Pacific culture.

Over those 82 years, Beach reinvented not only himself but America’s perception and appreciation of Pan-Pacific people. The book covers his entire life, including fascinating details and stories about his early years, which have remain shrouded in mystery. As it turns out, most of the tall tales and myths that have long surrounded Donn Beach were created and embellished by the man himself. But one thing is clear, Beach always lived up to his motto: “If you can’t get to paradise, I’ll bring it to you.”

In Searching for Don the Beachcomber, Glazer does his best to separate fact from fiction, but he also lets Beach’s rich archive of personal documents speak for themselves. The biography was made possible when Beach’s widow, Phoebe Beach, donated his personal papers, photos and other materials that she had been saving for the past 30+ years. Glazner has said they will end up in the collections of the Bishop Museum in Honolulu, which celebrates the history and culture of Hawaii and the Pacific.

Beach is best known today as the “Inventor of the Tiki Bar,” as the book’s subtitle states, a uniquely mainland American invention that he crafted in the shadow of 1930s Hollywood movie studios. But fate later brought the enterprising entrepreneur to the South Seas, where he spent most of the second half of his life, running namesake restaurants and spearheading projects that included the International Market Place in Waikiki. He was also a decorated veteran of World War II, rising to the rank of lieutenant colonel in the Army Air Force.

Throughout his lifetime, Beach ignored racial barriers by quietly hiring and promoting staff who were immigrants from many Pacific and southeast Asian countries, decades before civil rights legislation was a reality. Reading Searching for Don the Beachcomber will give you a much more in-depth picture of not only the creativity, but the integrity and vision of Donn Beach.

Glazner details many significant storylines, including Beach’s unusual relationship with his first wife, Sunny Sund, and their precarious association with organized crime. The book is also chock full of more than 200 rare images and documents from Beach’s archives, plus an appendix that includes many of the influential mixologist’s original recipes from the 1930s and ’40s.

To supplement those cocktails, Glazner has unearthed several of Beach’s secret ingredients that will soon be made available via BG Reynolds. Those special syrups – which Beach coded with simple names such as “#4” and “#7” – were part of his detailed efforts to keep his recipes under wraps. Glazner is also creator of the long-running app, The Grogalizer, which spotlights cocktails from Don the Beachcomber and other key sources.

While we await the book and syrups, you can meet Glazer and learn more about his research at several upcoming Tiki weekenders. He has two presentations planned for the Nor’Easter Island Tropical Weekend in Sturbridge, Mass., on Feb. 5-8. He’ll be discussing “Don the Beachcomber and the Mob in LA” in the 1930s along with “Donn Beach’s Wars at Home and Abroad” in the 1940s. At Tiki-a-Go-Go in Orlando, Fla. (March 27-29), Glazner will reprise the 1940s presentation and also explore the book’s many stories and his subject’s lasting legacy in “Donn Beach: The Man, the Myth and the Legend.” You can also find him in July at PDXotica in Portland, Ore.
• More on the event appearances

We were privileged to see an early copy of the manuscript, before the book was designed, so we’re looking forward to seeing the finished product. Glazner and Korero have shared the following page layouts as a sneak preview. Click for larger versions.

To promote the book’s release, Glazner has created a robust archive of video clips on his YouTube channel. Here’s just a small selection:

Searching for Don the Beachcomber
• Official website | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Korero Press

Glazner is also the associate producer of The Donn of Tiki, the award-winning documentary film released in 2024. After making the rounds of film festivals, it continues to be shown at independent theaters while the filmmakers plan a wider online or streaming release. Glazner also consulted with the new owners of the Don the Beachcomber restaurant brand, which launched in 2024 and currently includes one speakeasy-style location in Tampa with more to come.

BONUS COCKTAIL RECIPE

Thanks to decades of research by cocktail historian Jeff “Beachbum” Berry, most of Donn Beach’s early classics have been published in the New Orleans author’s six seminal books and app, beginning with Grog Log (1999). Others were revealed by Phoebe Beach in Hawai’i – Tropical Rum Drinks & Cuisine, her 2001 book with husband Arnold Bitner. Berry gained access to secret recipe books of bartenders who worked at Don the Beachcomber restaurants over the decades. The drinks in the Hawai’i book appear to be versions from late in Beach’s life, when he retired to the islands.

The 47 cocktail recipes in Glazer’s book, while similar to both of the above sources, are all confirmed to be from the formative years of Don the Beachcomber in Hollywood, circa 1937-42. This offers a unique snapshot into a time and place, just as Donn Beach went off to fight in World War II and gave up control of his restaurant empire to wife Sunny Sund. These are the core classics.

Among the unique aspects of these early recipes in the book are the secret syrups (#2, #4, #7) featured in some of them. As noted above, Glazer will soon be releasing commercial versions of these syrups based on Beach’s original formulas. The book also includes a few recipes that have never been revealed. One of these is featured below.

Don the Beachcomber cocktail completists will certainly know of Beachcomber’s Gold, famous for having three radically different versions. Grog Log featured a (widely panned) 1970s recipe while the Beach-Bitner book shared a version from the 1980s. In Beachbum Berry Remixed (2010), we got perhaps the definitive version, which the Bum sourced from bartenders who served the same recipe in 1937 and 1950.

Glazner also features the latter version his new book, right along side another 1937 cocktail that caught our eye. In all my time collecting and researching Don the Beachcomber recipes, I don’t recall ever coming across Beachcomber’s Silver. It’s a somewhat straightforward Daiquiri riff, so perhaps it just flew under the radar or didn’t seem worthy of publication.

Now, some 80 years after its creation, it’s long overdue for a revival …

Beachcomber’s Silver
By Don the Beachcomber, circa 1937
From Searching for Don the Beachcomber

• 1/2 ounce lime juice
• 1/2 ounce sugar syrup
• 1/4 ounce light Puerto Rican rum
• 3/4 ounce pisco aguardiente
• 1 dash each almond extract and absinthe

Shake with ice and strain into a saucer glass.

Light Puerto Rican rum, lime and sugar earmark this as a standard Daiquiri, but in classic Don the Beachcomber fashion we get some ingredients from left field thrown into the mix. Almond extract and absinthe are also featured in Beachcomber’s Gold, but the main spirit is a surprise.

Pisco is a traditional grape brandy from Peru and Chile, also often called an aguardiente. It’s a clear, unaged spirit most notably featured in the Pisco Sour and typically favored back in the day by Trader Vic, not Donn Beach. But in an effort to make this elevated Daiquiri stand out, Beach made a wise move. We chose Capal Pisco from Chile because we love the bottle, but use any quality product you see fit. The recipe called for Brugal, be we opted for an old bottle of Bacardi 1909 Heritage Limited Edition (89 proof), meant to emulate classic Puerto Rican rums from Donn Beach’s heyday. It’s a small amount, so use your favorite in this clean and crisp style, perhaps Havana Club.

The pisco and almond flavors give Beachcomber’s Silver a nice twist, dry but also featuring a rich mouthfeel. Because of the absinthe, there’s a great floral note that makes this a unique cocktail, befitting the Don the Beachcomber legacy.

Okole maluna!

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Cocktail Recipes, A through Z
A comprehensive list of every recipe we’ve posted on the site, including many Tiki classics, Mai-Kai tributes, and Atomic Grog originals.
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DON THE BEACHCOMBER RELAUNCH

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UPCOMING EVENTS

UPDATES: The Tiki Times: Exclusive events guide
Check the calendar for all of the major happenings around the world, from Tiki weekenders to rum festivals to marketplaces and music fests.