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Omnium Gatherum
CANADA Probably there never was a more interesting time to be part of Canadian media. Technology and facts of life in the marketplace offer chances for new approaches that are downright heady. Economics are slamming doors on media which are less than hardy. Look around. Gone is the North American News Alliance, which was bought by United Feature Syndicate in 1972, but couldn't afford top-notch writers anymore. The co-operative, begun in 1922, distributed Hemingway's dispatches from the Spanish Civil War and Thor Heyerdahl's Pacific Ocean crossing by raft. Yet here in Canada. United Press Canada is giving The Canadian Press its first real competition and likely will have more than 60 subscribers soon. Among them are the CBC and Global news. A lot of people simply seem to prefer good pictures and tight writing over weighty, if authoritative, prose. While buyers of TV advertising time claim that fewer people are watching many programs (because of options for entertainment), Canadian Cable systems is moving into some original programming, convinced that many of its potential 1,000,000 viewers are watching "community" shows. The British Columbia Court of Appeal has overturned the controversial libel conviction of Bob Bierman, who drew the B.C. human resources minister gleefully plucking wings off flies. The 1978 cartoon, it was argued successfully on appeal, was aimed at the office, not the man personally. * * * General manager of the Canadian Daily Newspaper Publishers Association, John Foy, has predicted ad revenues in 1981 of a billion dollars, two billion by 1986. The figure for last year is $836 million. * * * Ex-CKO, Bill Siggins went to CHRC television in Pembroke, Ont. as reporter. Also hired was Chris Scott as editor/cameraman. * * * Figures don't tell the whole story. The Daily Gleaner in Fredericton obviously is confident. The 100-year-old daily has opened a new 26,450-square-foot home with presses that can deliver 50,000 papers an hour. Circulation now is only half of that. * * * Ottawa Today survived only eight months before the morning tab went bankrupt in April 1978. Only 63 per cent of what was owing 88 former employees has been paid by directors, some $39,000. * * * Analysts have described Canadian Cablesystems as a good "long-term growth investment" because of demands for non-broadcast services on CATV, penetration of the comparatively virgin U.S. market and possibilities for pay-TV. * * * In radio, CHUM Ltd. showed a profit of $820,112 just for the three months ended Nov. 30/79 on revenue of $17.1 million, in comparison to $717,657 on $15.2 million a year earlier. * * * Radio Bureau of Canada president Jim Adam forecast a billion dollars' advertising each year of the Eighties. The 1970 ad revenues rose just under 200 percent. * * * Among weeklies, Markle Community Newspapers sold its papers to management personnel in Collmgwood, Orillia, Midland. Penetanguishene, Elmvale (all in Ontario), as well as Friday editions of the Collingwood Times and Midland Citizen. Bayweb in Elmvale still will do the printing for all. * * * Media Club of Canada's Ottawa Branch has elected a 14-member executive which includes Jacqueline Cernat in The Chair, secretary Merle Storey, and treasurer Bonnie Kines. * * * Latest little newsletter to cease publication is Safrican News in Toronto which, says Charlotte Maxwell and Mary Jane Gomes, "ran out of one vital ingredientmoney." * * * The Corporation has named Susan Reisler as foreign correspondent in CBC's Washington bureau. Born in Port Hope, Ont., she joined the U. of T. Varsity and was on Parliament Hill for the Student Press Co-operative before joining UPI. She went to CBC Radio in Toronto in 1975 and has worked with Sunday Morning since it began in 1976. * * * Amidst all of the uncertainty in the publishing world, union members are more determined to tack down pension plans, seniority and similar, long-range issues. In New York, Local 3 of The Newspaper Guild talks of "a year of turbulence" in the December 1979 issue of its Frontpage. * * * Did you hear how some editors had nipples touched up in (out-of, actually) Wonderbra's Dici Nova ads? The art director for J. Walter Thompson, Montreal, says a major Canadian magazine and one large Western daily wouldn't even run the ad. That's what happens when so many guys are bottle-fed, I guess. * * * Working media gals might appreciate "A Feminist Media Conference," at the National Press Club in Washington, April 12-13, as a model. The agenda for triple-networking feminist organizations, feminist media and feminists in the mass media included Feminists/Media networking to expand the women's movement, New Ways to Get Feminist Ideas Out, and Financing Expansion of Feminist Outreach. * * * Mind you, profits for some corporations are genuinely corpulent. Torstar reported consolidated net income from 12 months ending Dec. 31/79 at $18,826,000 on revenue of $371.1 million. Comparable figures on the previous 12-month audit were $13,759,000 on $277,471,000 revenue. * * * Profits for The Toronto Sun rose 70 percent in the last nine months of 1979 on revenue of $42,900,000 and earnings of $2,062,000. Year-end circulation had risen to 229,575 weekdays and 360,673 on Sundays. * * * Fewer competitors obviously may be part of the final solution. Since Thomson bought complete control of FP, it obviously will be at odds in many two-paper cities. Some dailies, while it may take years, are bound to fade. * * * At community colleges, journalism and radio-television students watch tuitions rise. President Jacqueline Robarts, for instance, at Niagara in Welland, Ont., was presented with proposed expenditures which were $2,610,233 over projected revenue. She ordered cutbacks. * * * Elsewhere, the Sunday Post of Canada "no longer can afford to continue" said managing editor Rob Ashley when the Ottawa weekly laid off its 22 full-time employees in February. As to hopes of a new buyer, the paper hasn't "received a single serious offer." The 10,000 reader paper was 19 months old and had lost $500,000. * * * Audit Bureau of Circulation studies to the end of last September showed more U.S. papers with improved circulation, but news was bad in Canada. There are 1,769 dailies (up by 6 from 1978) in the U.S., with 62,088,960 readers on average (up 253,375 in a year). Here, there still are 121 dailies with 5,159,841 average daily circulation (down 103,156 in 12 months). * * * Publisher John Macfarlane has plans to make Saturday Night magazine "livelier and more audacious" and to go to 12 issues a year rather from ten because New Leaf Publications has "new strength" since Norman Webster purchased all of the shares. * * * Formerly at Financial Post, Valerie Chrysdale is editorial controller of Maclean's editorial department. Editing Canadian Driver and Owner is Rolf Lockwood, formerly an editor at Macmillan. One-time freelancer Wayne Paterson edits Monday Report on Retailers and Shopping Centre Canada. * * * Assistant copy editors are Luha Zisser and Linda Gregg (both at Chatelaine). Assistant editor at Canadian Jeweller is John Milne. New staff writers include Jane Mussett at Style Magazine and Brian Dunn (formerly Montreal Star) with Marketing. * * * New fashion and beauty editor for City Woman (with controlled circulation in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver of 210,000) is sometime-TV producer and award-winning photographer, Beverley Rockett. * * * A lot of recent changes within the Maclean-Hunter fold. Reporting now at The Financial Post (formerly with Financial Times and the Toronto Star) is Jennifer Grass. Assistant editor of special reports for the Post is Renate Lerch. She too was once at the Times. Peter Redman, new Post photo editor, hails from the Etobicoke Advertiser/Guardian. Ann Shortell is a new staff writer. So is eager and versatile Wayne Gooding. * * * Legislator-turned-columnist Stephen Lewis told business students there, statistics on a strengthening economy may be misleading. "Those who derive sensuous pleasure from numbers may be fundamentally warped," he warned. * * * The comparatively wealthy Ontario Educational Communications Authority was down $2 million this year, but made up the difference by sales of two productions to other broadcasters. * * * All of these things seem to point out the obvious: the readjustments require more than temporary shifts. Media are undergoing a real shakedown, in which two inexperienced staff come for the price of one "old pro" and increasingly specialized products are required for much smaller markets while costs for them are rising. One answer may be world scale periodicals or programs. The other obvious answer is higher prices. Toronto Sun, Moose Jaw Times-Herald and Kitchener-Waterloo Record all have gone to 25¢ a copy from $20 weekdays. There is the Regina Leader-Post. It jumped 10¢ to 35¢ daily. * * * Parliament Hill seems a good training-ground for journalists covering the Maritimes. Peter Van Dusen went East as first Atlantic correspondent for News-Radio. As newscaster and commentator at CHNS in Halifax is Fearless Fred the Ennis, formerly of Standard Broadcast News. Dick James, long a BN Ottawa fixture, moved Down East. * * * Dennis Passa is Ontario news editor for Candianan Press succceding Joan Walters, who now is CP bureau chief at the Ontario legislature. * * * Barbara Wright is new executive director for the Periodical Writers Association of Canada, replacing Sheila McIntyre after three years. Her first big job is completing the magazine fees survey. Responses have been slow. * * * If there is any justice in the world it may be found in the following three brief items:
* * * Ken MacTaggart, retired in Flesherton now, is one of the latest membersof our News Hall of Fame. Toronto-born, he won his second National Newspaper Award for moving stories on the plight of South African blacks. Other new members are: Jim Coleman (appointed to the Ontario Racing Commission in 1973) at 62, respected for his newspaper sports news and columns; Helen Allen, whose name is well-known in Ontario because in her 40-year reporting career, she found time and concern for Today's Child, a column about kids who need homes, in 24 dailies and Lord only knows how many weeklies, begun with the Toronto Telegram in 1964; Joseph Francois Olivar Asselin, who was born in 1874 at St. Hilarion, Quebec, died in 1937 and in between founded Le Devoir and Le Nationaliste. * * * More than a few changes on Parliament Hill. Phil Hurcomb is parliamentary correspondent for the Canadian University Press, replacing Peter Hirt (now with the Ontario Federation of Students). Kathy Lynas is newest staff at News-Radio's bureau. Bill Fox (formerly of Southam News,) is with the Toronto Star bureau, vacated by John Honderich. Another recent addition is Pam Wallin. Canadian Press assistant editor Carl Mollins now is Washington bureau chief; John Heney is in Vancouver. New faces include Dave Rooney and Jim Sheppard. ATLANTIC * * * Now a story editor for CBC's New Brunswick Report is Lyn Kelly (formerly with CBC national TV, Toronto) on CHSJ television in Saint John.* * * Gone to Halifax are George Jordon (co-host) and Havoc Franklin (producer) of CBD Information Morning in Saint John. Jordon now produces the CBC's Morning Show in Halifax. Franklin is national producer in Halifax for CBC Radio. * * * Odd Press, Radio and TV Club in Saint John. Latest executive includes Secretary Doreen Meltzer (who is a secretary), Treasurer Rick Phillips and past pres Bill Quartermain. Both the latter are printers. So is Vice- Bill Foster. President Gary Dean is in circulation. Thank God John Miller, Second Vice-president, works in news at CBD in Saint John. * * * In Nova Scotia, Kenneth E. Forran is managing editor and Max F. Keddy, assistant ME of The Chronicle-Herald and The Mail-Star. * * * From CBC Radio in Charlottetown, Gerry Burt now co-hosts CBD's Information Morning in Saint John. * * * Gone from Saint John, but still with CHSJ radio/TV, Ken Kingston has moved to northeastern New Brunswick. * * * With CFNB in Fredericton is Robert Burns (ex-CHER radio in Sydney, N.S.) * * * At CIHI radio in Fredericton news director is Gregg McCullough, new program director is Doug Pond (formerly CKCW Moncton), who replaces retiring Wayne Dion, and returned is Michael MacFayden. * * * In the CBZ newsroom (CBC Fredericton) is Roy Gjelstad (formerly of the Weekend News Show, ATV Moncton). QUEBEC With $4,400,000 for two more transmitters on its non-commercial Radio-Quebéc TV network, the provincial government's French-language programs will be accessible to 80 per cent of the population. * * * Editor Charles Bury isn't very impressed with $30,000 in provincial grants to the Eastern Township Sun. They're supposed to cover salaries of four people for two years and he figures that will pay him a princely $90 weekly. Low salaries, he is reported to have said, already contributed to the break-up of his marriage. * * * Québécor's Sunday Express was planning only a local front page, page three and sports section for an Ottawa edition. The goal is 20,000 in circulation in the capital region, up from 10,000 at present. * * * Among people on the move is Alycia Ambrosziak, formerly of the Montreal Star. She's in Quebec City for United Press, replacing Bob Quinn (now with CJAD in Montreal). Looking for Isabella Grigoroff (copy editor with The Montreal Star, now defunct), we found her reporting business at the Saint John Telegraph-Journal and Evening Times-Globe. Writing features in the same newsroom is Valerie Gregory (ex-Star). * * * Lysiane Gagnon (La Presse) is still on the political beat, but has moved back to Montreal after three years' reporting from the National Assembly. * * * The Newspaper Guild has sent out cheques,each worth several hundred dollars, and totalling $150,000 to members of the defunct Montreal Star unit. They made up for benefits which were supposed to be paid during an wight-month lay-off, June 1978 to February 1979. More cheques are expected by summer as the Guild still owes the Star people $175,000. Benefits were withheld for a simple reason: the Guild didn't have the money. ONTARIO Leaving the Hamilton Spectator are three retirees: Norma Bidwell (food/consumer columnist for 25 years), Joe Watkins (a one-time CP telegrapher and sportswriter since 1956), Art Burnell (who moved to Oakville bureau in 1961 after 20 years with the Toronto Telegram. * * * Back in Hamilton (this time at CJID Radio) from CKKW in Kitchener is one-time CHML personality Bob Bratina. * * *
New Toronto-London news and program director at CKO is Bill Sheppard (formerly CKFH, CJRN, CHUM), replacing Garfield Chessom (returned to CKO Edmonton). First voice Sheppard hired in Toronto is Jim Morris (formerly CKFH). * * * Gone to Canada Now as story editor is George Jahn of Broadcast News; Rick Gibbons is now BN farm reporter in Ottawa (his home stomping-ground); Regis Cornale (formerly BN Queen's Park, CKLC) is with Selkirk News, Ottawa. * * * Seasons is the new name of Ontario Naturalist, published by the Federation of Naturalists. The quarterly has broadened its appeal and now has a national attitude with hopes of larger circulation. * * * A Forum of the Future is planned for the Ontario Weekly Newspaper Association fall meeting in Ottawa at the Skyline, along with regular seminars. Speakers for government and the communications industry join suppliers for a look at where community papers are going and why. * * * Meanwhile, the meeting of International Society of Weekly Newspaper Editors is being held June 7-12, in Canada for a change, at Brock University in St. Catherines. And, listen to topics for the sessions: Indian-Eskimo problems, future of railroads, publicly supported medicine. Guest speaker comes from Saskatchewan: Ltnt.-Gov. Irwin McIntosh. * * * CHUM has received an Ohio Atate University Award for "excellence in educational, informational and public affairs broadcasting" for coverage of the Three Mile Island accident. Stranger yet, Bob Kennedy, as news director, collected it in a tuxedo, no less. Yup. THE WEST Associate publisher for Community Printers (1978) Ltd. at Nipawin, Sask, is Brian McLane. Involved are Nipawin Journal, the Carrot River Observer, The Star City and Naicam Echo-Sentinel, and The Northeast Region Community Booster. * * * At The Calgary Herald, after Southam made John Howes its roving energy correspondent, the business editor's chair was filled by Kevin Peterson, news editor for the last two years. A new post is assistant city editor, filled by Barry Nelson, a city-side reporter who now handles copy control. * * * Bert Hancock (Raymond, Alta. Review) does extra paste-up nowadays, since he bought Cardston Chronicle. The papers are issued separately. * * * The Stoney Plain Reporter has added Janice Leffler to writing-reporter staff. * * * Joining Environment Canada's western pub affairs unit and working Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and the Northwest out of Edmonton are Judy Fisher and Patricia Logan. BC Some new voices. Jeff Hamilton has replaced Greg Collins, who after seven years of mornings at CFOX-FM wanted to try his hand as a writer in Los Angeles. On the AM side in Vancouver, CKLG news director Ted Farr is assistant P.D., replaced by Stu McAllister (formerly of Kelowna and Prince George). He inherits nine AM news staff, 3FMers. * * * After seven years of sportscasting on CKWX, Neil Macrae has returnedd to CJOR in Vancouver to host nightly sport talk shows. At the Vancouver Community College J-program, acting head is Gerald Porter (formerly with The Vancouver Sun). He's repliacing Nick Russell, who is on a six-month sabbatical in the U.K. * * * As instructor in broadcast journalism David Proctor from CKVU has replaced John Ashbridge (Gone back to CKNW). Part-time CKNW newscaster is Yvonne Eamor of VCC. Graduate Brad Cooper is reporting for the Langley Advance. * * * "It's obvious The Province is in trouble." wrote Jack Danylchuk in a January Inner Ear story for Victoria's Monday Magazine. Suburban weeklies, mini-catalogues and flyers were supposed to be hurting recovery after the seven-month Pacific Press strike. Matter of fact, Province advertising department says circulation Sunday-Friday has averaged 126,000 (not 110,000 quoted), down 4,000 and that mostly in rural distribution. On the other hand (this is a chuckle, boys, don't get your dander up) maybe reporter Chuck Paylsen knows something. He has left The Province to go into the carpet cleaning business! * * * Vancouver Good Sports have been shuffling about. CBC-TV's late night sportscaster Paul McConnel, is doubling as CKWX sport editorialist. Back at CJOR with a sports hotline is Neil McRae, who left for CKWX, but returned. Along with a weekly Courier column on sport and his coverage for CFUN, Greg Douglas has been busy doing editorials for CKVU-TV and for CKWX. * * * Back with CFUN is Tom Lucas, who left CKVU's Vancouver Show. * * * Doing PR with the B.C. School Trustees Association is Kathy Ford, former sports editor for the Delta Optimist. Executive director of the Cold Maountain Institute is former broadcaster Peggie Merlin. Acting PR diretor for Vancouver's Whitecaps soccer team is Gord Couling, recent VCC J-grad. OBITUARIES Recipient of the first Govenor-General Awards for his work on a joint Financial Post-CBC print-televison series, Clive Baxter died at age 48 from cancer. Born in London, he came to Canada in 1954, and worked for The Financial Post in Toronto and Montreal before becoming Ottawa editor in the early Sixties. He also had won the National Business Writing Award, the Aviation Writing Award and the Kenneth R. Wilson Award (twice) * * * An Ottawa-native, editorial writer James Roe of Regina's Leader-Post (born 1921) died after a heart attack April 12. One-time parliamentary press gallery member, he held senior editorial posts in Cornerbrook, Toronto, Ottawa and Vancouver, before joining The Leader-Post in 1971. * * * A veteran newsman in the Niagara peninsula for 35 years has died of a heart attack at 68. Jimmy Simpson, copy editor for the St. Catherines (Ont.) Standard, began work there in 1947. Two years later, he unsuccessfully attempted a new paper in the city and, failing, freelanced for The Globe and Mail an Niagara Editorial Bureau. He was Niagara Bureau Chief for the Globe from 1953 to 1967, before returning to the Standard. * * * At 67, managing editor of the Canadian Railwayman, Arthur MacDonald is dead. He once worked with the Halifax Chronicle as editor and with the Ottawa Journal as city and telegraph editor. * * * Killed in a car crash near Lake Louise, Alberta, was 26-year-old Mississauga reporter Anita Marie LeBlanc-Oppel. Her vehicle was in collision with a semi-trailer. Injured was freelancer, Jenny Piekos of Calgary. * * * Cancer has claimed the life of Cynthia Gunn Seltzer, assistant people editor at Montreal's Gazette, who died March 10 at 36. She had also been with The Montreal Star and The Winnipeg Free Press. Contributions in her memory may be made to the Cynthia Gunn Journalism Award, Concordia University School of Journalism, 1455 de Maisonneuve Blvd. West, Montreal H3G1M7. MAGAZINES "Fashion" is the straight-forward name of the newest section of The Globe and Mail, which made its debut April l5. Expected to appear about 40 times a year, the new section is produced by the Globe's recently added Lifestyles Department, which also puts out the Monday "Science" section. Heading the department is lifestyles editor Terry Christian. Assistant lifestyles editor is Lenore Macdonald and art director Robbi Nyman. Also at work in lifestyles are fashion writer Joyce Carter, reporter Bev Brown and copy editor Vivian Smith (late of the St. Catherines Standard). Response to the first issue of The Montreal Business Report, published by the Concordia Centre for Management Studies, has been "overwhelming, just incredible" according to editor Robert Karniol, who says so many ads have been sold that the second edition of the glossy quarterly will probably run 100 pages. The magazine is looking for freelancers in the Montreal region and will consider queries from, freelancers elsewhere for national business stories with a Montreal angle. * * * Phoenix Rising is the title of a new quarterly magazine published by On Our Own, a Group of present and former psychiatric inmates to agitate for change in the mental health system, which the magazine says is "all too often damaging rather than helpful and oppressive rather than liberating." Subscriptions are $5 per year and can be had from On Our Own. Box 7251, Station A, Toronto, Ont. M5W 1X9.
Published in SOURCES May-June 1980
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