Watered Down
Staying afloat is no easy task in the tiny publishing world of Atlantic Canada. The surest way to smooth sailing? Don't make waves
Coastlife magazine was conceived in November 1998 around a coffee table laden with a pot of tea, mugs and bowls of hummus and chips. Kyle Shaw, Christine Oreskovich, Catherine Salisbury and Heidi Hallet had gathered at Shaw and Oreskovich’s Halifax home for the fall board meeting of The Coast, at the time a five-year-old weekly […]
Apocalypse Bob
"An eco-shitstorm is coming," says Citytv ecology specialist and Greenpeace co-founder Bob Hunter. Out to save the world, he's partisan, pissed off and proud of it
It’s 4:30 a.m. Bob Hunter turns off his alarm clock, steps into his slippers and selects a robe from one of nearly a dozen in his closet. In the bathroom, he gathers his long, thin, greying hair and ties it back into a ponytail, splashes cold water on his face and hooks his dark-rimmed glasses […]
Bad Boys, Booze and Bylines
The rise and demise of the Toronto Press Club
The press club door had a buzzer in those days. You had to ring the buzzer and then wait for the door to open. On this night, someone is leaning on the buzzer. Inside, as the door opens, turned heads watch with surprise-and no surprise-as Duncan Macpherson falls through to the floor. He’s drunk, with […]
Dances with Journalists
A Mohawk writer on media racism
“And everyone laughed. It was so preposterous, as if I said to you that the world is flat. People don’t realize how unanimous and overwhelming the conventional wisdom was.” – Michele Landsberg, recalling an incident in the 1950s as a first-year student at the University of Toronto. She had told a group of students that […]
A Woman’s Place in the News
The women's pages are back. But are the women?
Joanne Ramondt thought she had found a good example of male bias in the pages of the Calgary Herald. In a photo of a husband and wife business team, the husband was standing in the foreground, clearly the focus of attention, while the wife sat off in the background with the children. Ramondt is a […]
Understated and Understood
A columnist explains why she'd rather reason than rant
My first unfavourable review hurt more than I let on. It was 1989. I had been The Toronto Star’s national affairs columnist for four years and I was beginning to feel comfortable in the job. “No one expects her to persuade or entertain,” wrote Charlotte Gray in Saturday Night. “Were a strong opinion or a […]
The Wholesome Story
Canadian Living's recipe for success
When Canadian Living published its 150th issue in 1989, Norma Taylor of Summit Lake, British Columbia crocheted a blanket and sent it to the staff to mark the occasion. Taylor isn’t a former Canadian Living staff member and she’s not the editor’s mother. She’s just one of thousands of loyal readers across the country who […]
Freedom’s just another word
That's why we have to define it for ourselves
In a recent column in Macleans, Barbara Amiel points to some of the seamier practices of the British “gutter” press, which not only delves into the private lives of the royal family but, as she says, lays siege for weeks on end to relatives of murder victims, invades hospital rooms and wiretaps conversations. Amiel suggests […]
Back Where he Belongs
Forced from the Globe four years ago, Norman Webster says he's happy at the Gazette
This is a story of cliches. An interview with Norman Webster sounds like a journalism 101 class, or an introduction to journalistic ethics. Norman Webster is fair to the extreme and adamant in his belief that every point of view has a right to be heard. If there is a “Queen’s scout” of Canadian journalism, […]
Hooked on Crime
Chasing the siren call of the police beat
Through the static of Rob Lamberti’s police scanner, the calm, detached voice of a female dispatcher announces that a car has crashed and is on fire on Queens Quay West. “Maybe we’ll get a Pepsodent smile tonight,” The Toronto Sun reporter says with a wry grin as he floors his red jeep and heads for […]
