The Covid Catalog, Gone Too Soon, Mike Gotovac.
The Covid Catalog remembers Mike Gotovac, 76, of Los Angeles.
Miljenko ‘Mike’ Gotovac died on May 14, 2020, due to Covid-19 complications. He was 76. Mike was a bartender at West Hollywood’s iconic restaurant Dan Tana’s, for over 50 years. He was the constant one amongst ever-changing actors, rock stars, barflies and dreamers. He was one of the oldest working bartenders in L.A. until his hospitalization on March 16.
Gotovac was born in 1943 in the village of Lecevica, Croatia. He joined Croatians who travelled to Germany to escape the economy of Yugoslavia when he was still young. He landed in L. A. in 1967 and joined the city’s Croatian community. He became the bartender at Dan Tana’s a year later.
He loved sports and old cowboy westerns. Gotovac brought some of the bar’s customers who had nowhere to go for the holidays. He was a dedicated family man, a parishioner at St. Anthony Croatian Catholic Church and a soccer player.
Mike spent his good times dancing with his wife or doting his granddaughters, who were his greatest joy.
https://www.latimes.com/projects/coronavirus-lives-lost-in-california/#mike-gotovac