Transcript
00:00:02 Speaker 1
There is a very movie.
00:00:02 Speaker 2
If the wings were owned people, you can come over.
00:00:06 Speaker 2
You probably have.
00:00:09 Speaker 1
We’re here.
00:00:11 Speaker 2
Probably be a good idea.
00:00:11 Speaker 1
Yeah, sure.
00:00:12 Speaker 2
The microphones are a little more sensitive sometimes than I’d like them to be.
00:00:16 Speaker 2
Was talking to Tommy Darling and I swear every truck in Ontario went by his office there on Main Street.
00:00:20 Speaker 1
Right.
00:00:23 Speaker 1
Have they saw Thomas done by meter?
00:00:26 Speaker 1
He came in.
00:00:27 Speaker 1
The colony, when he was down there.
00:00:28 Speaker 1
Last, you know, two years ago.
00:00:32 Speaker 1
Well, where do you like to start?
00:00:34 Speaker 2
Well, you had been on this talk with circuit for some time and the word observed I don’t know how accurately you came to conclusion that maybe your days were numbered and there was a future and selling advertising.
00:00:47 Speaker 2
We went then into the.
00:00:49 Speaker 2
In the advertising universe.
00:00:50 Speaker 1
That’s correct.
00:00:51 Speaker 1
Actually, I had gotten married.
00:00:53 Speaker 1
As a matter of fact in August.
00:00:56 Speaker 1
1926 and had spent almost five years and might use the.
00:01:02 Speaker 1
Term on the road.
00:01:04 Speaker 1
Which was the male quartet.
00:01:07 Speaker 1
And wanted to get out.
00:01:08 Speaker 1
Of it.
00:01:10 Speaker 1
And I think, Peter, I don’t want to cover too much ground that he’s covered, but when we didn’t get paid for an engagement.
00:01:20 Speaker 1
In Pittsburgh over KDK.
00:01:23 Speaker 1
I, being the youngest of the Quartet.
00:01:26 Speaker 1
Those precocious I suppose, I asked why.
00:01:31 Speaker 1
Because we were always supposed to pick up the check before we performed.
00:01:36 Speaker 2
It was probably wise in those days because the company may not have any money.
00:01:38 Speaker 1
Yes, it was.
00:01:40 Speaker 1
But I was told that this was a sustaining program.
00:01:45 Speaker 1
Not knowing anything about it.
00:01:47 Speaker 1
Asked what that was.
00:01:48 Speaker 1
Well, that was the program that was put on for almost was for the benefit for the artist.
00:01:59 Speaker 1
Who needed publicity?
00:02:00 Speaker 1
And I can recall making remarks.
00:02:03 Speaker 1
We don’t need any bloody publicity and any professional group.
00:02:10 Speaker 1
What other kind of a program and the reply was?
00:02:13 Speaker 1
Well, there’s a sponsored program where the advertiser pays for the facilities of the station and the talent.
00:02:21 Speaker 1
That fed me thinking and.
00:02:24 Speaker 1
That fall, actually, I wrote somewhere in in the Midwestern USA.
00:02:34 Speaker 1
I began thinking about it and came back in December, early December 1926 and got in touch with a pal of mine.
00:02:43 Speaker 1
Another singer, by the way, by the name of Shear.
00:02:47 Speaker 1
And he was a school teacher in Toronto.
00:02:51 Speaker 1
And was a little bit fed up with it.
00:02:55 Speaker 1
I explained to him what I had in mind and he said Bush.
00:02:59 Speaker 1
I’d like to join with you if I can get.
00:03:01 Speaker 1
Leave of absence.
00:03:02 Speaker 1
It was a pretty.
00:03:03 Speaker 1
The curious thing for him, I could have gone on with the Quartet and he could have remained as a teacher, but neither one of us were very happy at that time because, quite frankly.
00:03:16 Speaker 1
The days of male quartet singing from.
00:03:20 Speaker 1
Particularly from standard scores.
00:03:23 Speaker 1
Is over.
00:03:27 Speaker 1
We were invited as a matter of fact, to go into vaudeville.
00:03:31 Speaker 1
One of our members of the Quartet, riding Holoman, refused.
00:03:36 Speaker 1
So it appeared to me, as this quartet may well break up, which it did in 1927.
00:03:44 Speaker 1
So we started this, came back and started this little broadcasting service and we had in January of 1927.
00:03:54 Speaker 1
4-5.
00:03:58 Speaker 1
Large companies sponsoring.
00:04:01 Speaker 1
But I still call some of the best programs in radio that have ever been.
00:04:04 Speaker 1
Put on the air.
00:04:05 Speaker 2
Where you put the programs together, did you yourselves?
00:04:07 Speaker 1
We put the programs together, we were the producers.
00:04:10 Speaker 1
Scheer was the announcer.
00:04:11 Speaker 1
He was a very good baritone and a very good announcer.
00:04:14 Speaker 1
I never was good announcer.
00:04:15 Speaker 1
I don’t know why the devil anybody ever hired me for that, because I still talk through my notes.
00:04:24 Speaker 1
So we had a good season actually for 13 weeks.
00:04:30 Speaker 1
And much to our dismay, we couldn’t get the contracts renewed, although the programs had been successful.
00:04:36 Speaker 1
And apparently the advertising had been worthwhile.
00:04:39 Speaker 2
What types of programs were you putting on?
00:04:45 Speaker 2
Live were recorded.
00:04:47 Speaker 1
Oh, no, they’re well.
00:04:51 Speaker 1
Nor these raw life programs.
00:04:54 Speaker 1
We had to make a leaf milling company.
00:04:58 Speaker 1
With an orchestra at that time conducted by Red Stewart with Miss Stewart’s 26 Piece Orchestra.
00:05:06 Speaker 1
With four solos.
00:05:08 Speaker 1
On our show.
00:05:10 Speaker 1
We had the.
00:05:12 Speaker 1
One of our first artists was Earnest Seitz.
00:05:16 Speaker 1
There’s a great Canadian pianist.
00:05:18 Speaker 1
His father owned the.
00:05:21 Speaker 1
Retail office supply company in Toronto so.
00:05:28 Speaker 1
Because Ernest had been on the air for two or three of these programs.
00:05:33 Speaker 1
And so they decided he’d like the sponsor for that.
00:05:38 Speaker 1
We had the first see more much of the same tide tight, probably not as large.
00:05:46 Speaker 1
In numbers but.
00:05:49 Speaker 1
Oh, quite successful.
00:05:51 Speaker 1
Then came.
00:05:56 Speaker 1
Latter part of March and April.
00:05:58 Speaker 1
And the sponsors.
00:06:00 Speaker 1
Weren’t willing to renew their contracts for the summer, that they would come back in the fall. We operated out of CJC, which was the old Bible student station.
00:06:10 Speaker 2
Was that an actual station or did or did they share a frequency with RB?
00:06:15 Speaker 1
Now they share the frequency as a matter of fact, with the with the Toronto Star.
00:06:19 Speaker 2
Let’s see.
00:06:20 Speaker 1
Yeah, that’s what started nationalization of radio.
00:06:24 Speaker 2
The all the cougal about the about the not being very nice to other other religions and other people.
00:06:29 Speaker 1
Well, actually what really started it?
00:06:34 Speaker 1
Bill Cameron was the Reverend William Bill Cameron was the pastor of Bruce Street Baptist Church.
00:06:42 Speaker 1
And Bill was very Ella.
00:06:44 Speaker 1
They Bible student CJ YC shared time with CSA, owned by the star.
00:06:54 Speaker 1
The Bible students had the air from 8:30 to.
00:06:58 Speaker 1
Ten, I think.
00:07:00 Speaker 1
And Csca had the air from 7:00 to 8:30.
00:07:06 Speaker 1
It was a very almost evangelical tape.
00:07:09 Speaker 1
Of the Minister and he got.
00:07:13 Speaker 1
Wound up with his sermon and.
00:07:17 Speaker 1
Some 830, the Bible student said. It’s our time and they just went on the air in the house. You could hear all.
00:07:22 Speaker 1
Over the continent.
00:07:26 Speaker 1
The chapter the name of transition.
00:07:29 Speaker 1
Was the editor of the Star at that time and he was a great friend of Mackenzie kings.
00:07:35 Speaker 1
He came down to Ottawa, raising cane about what had happened in Toronto, and I believe it was he who suggested that radio should be nationalized and.
00:07:46 Speaker 1
That’s really the that was the the.
00:07:49 Speaker 1
The beginning of the idea of nationalization already.
00:07:52 Speaker 2
Eventually that year, they refused to renew the license of CJ voicing.
00:07:56 Speaker 1
Well, all of the stations, they had three of them.
00:07:59 Speaker 1
They won in the Maritimes.
00:08:00 Speaker 1
One of them, I think it was Saskatoon.
00:08:04 Speaker 1
And the owner, Toronto.
00:08:10 Speaker 1
A very good friend of mine, Don Manson, who eventually became general manager of CBC for a period of about a year.
00:08:20 Speaker 1
It was then at the old radius section of the Department of Marine and Fisheries.
00:08:28 Speaker 1
I think he had something to do with the cancellation of it.
00:08:31 Speaker 1
I can remember telling me that they had over 80 bags of mail command protesting against the cancellation of these states.
00:08:39 Speaker 1
That’s really I think the genesis of nationalization.
00:08:43 Speaker 1
Anyway, Mr. Shirdi?
00:08:48 Speaker 1
Decided that we’d have to do something for the summer and we’d been rather successful.
00:08:54 Speaker 1
CFRB had opened in 19 February what the 19th, 17th to 19th, 1927.
00:09:03 Speaker 1
And we got a call from management CFRB.
00:09:08 Speaker 1
Asking us, we would be interested in moving over there.
00:09:12 Speaker 1
So we love to see Ted Rogers and.
00:09:16 Speaker 1
Ellsworth and the chapter name of Moore, who was the secretary treasurer.
00:09:22 Speaker 1
Of Rogers.
00:09:26 Speaker 1
Rogers Radio and make a Long story short, they hired us.
00:09:32 Speaker 1
$50.00 a week between us.
00:09:35 Speaker 2
Really wasn’t bad money though, and yes.
00:09:37 Speaker 1
Well, it’s well, it’s better than nothing. And 15% Commission. They didn’t have any advertising of any consequence on the air.
00:09:45 Speaker 1
And couldn’t keep it on the air because, Ted, that’s the you may know the you know, the present Ted Rogers has been very successful in Toronto Radio Cablevision.
00:09:58 Speaker 1
Ted was trying to convert the the.
00:10:01 Speaker 1
Transmitter Aurora.
00:10:04 Speaker 1
To the batteryless place of operation.
00:10:08 Speaker 1
And he’d go up there and in the middle of any program that make any difference what it was.
00:10:13 Speaker 1
I mean, he just pulled the station off the earth.
00:10:16 Speaker 1
So it was very difficult to sell advertising.
00:10:19 Speaker 1
Well, we lasted there from the sometime in June.
00:10:24 Speaker 1
Of 1927 until March of 1928, and the voters failed, we both got fired.
00:10:30 Speaker 1
Incidentally, we were the 9th managers at the station that had from February to June.
00:10:39 Speaker 1
So none of us lasted very long.
00:10:41 Speaker 2
It was not a permanent job, no.
00:10:43 Speaker 1
It wasn’t very permanent.
00:10:46 Speaker 1
And the curious part of it is rather pleasant experience.
00:10:52 Speaker 1
I I went to Hamilton to work for the summer and then came back and was engaged as an announcer at CKC, the national carpet company.
00:11:03 Speaker 1
And eventually became manager of that.
00:11:09 Speaker 1
Some four years later, I was offered the job as a matter of fact, of going back to CFRB.
00:11:15 Speaker 1
By that time.
00:11:17 Speaker 1
Radio had been nationalized and they had the old Canadian radio.
00:11:22 Speaker 1
Podcasting Commission.
00:11:25 Speaker 1
And Arthur Steele was really running it.
00:11:28 Speaker 1
Hector Charles was was the chairman and Tom on my hair was the vice chairman.
00:11:33 Speaker 1
But Arthur Steele really ran the thing.
00:11:39 Speaker 1
I came down to see him about it.
00:11:42 Speaker 1
See what the future was likely to be and.
00:11:49 Speaker 1
And he told me not to accept the job at CFRB because they were going to take it over.
00:11:55 Speaker 1
Going to expropriate it.
00:11:56 Speaker 1
Instead of that they expropriated CGW, go to the work station.
00:12:02 Speaker 1
So I turned down the opportunity of going back to CFRB and Harry.
00:12:06 Speaker 1
Cedric took it up.
00:12:10 Speaker 1
Well, as I say, I stayed at the.
00:12:13 Speaker 1
CCNC then.
00:12:17 Speaker 1
From January 28th, I guess to.
00:12:24 Speaker 1
November the 1st, 1933.
00:12:29 Speaker 1
And enjoyed it very much.
00:12:32 Speaker 2
Why did you leave and see at that time?
00:12:37 Speaker 1
I’m a great fatalist.
00:12:40 Speaker 1
What is to me will be?
00:12:47 Speaker 1
In 19, the summer of 1933, my boss is pictures up there. Mr. Drake, Mr. Mackenzie.
00:12:57 Speaker 1
And the two in the bottom row in the in the right of the pictures on the left.
00:13:05 Speaker 1
They, Mr.
00:13:06 Speaker 1
Drake, was my immediate boss.
00:13:08 Speaker 1
I would like to play golf on Wednesday afternoon.
00:13:12 Speaker 1
In June, early June, I sent my family down to the shores of lakes for the summer.
00:13:19 Speaker 1
Or at least had engaged to read at a cottage down there.
00:13:23 Speaker 1
And on Thursday morning, I was met at the door by Mr.
00:13:27 Speaker 1
He said.
00:13:27 Speaker 1
Well, congratulations Ernie.
00:13:31 Speaker 1
And I said, well, that’s a hell of a way to fire a guy.
00:13:33 Speaker 1
What’s wrong now?
00:13:34 Speaker 1
Just because I go to play golf on Wednesday afternoon.
00:13:38 Speaker 1
Well, he said you weren’t here, so we couldn’t consult you.
00:13:41 Speaker 1
But he said Colonel Steele called yesterday and he wants you to go to Western Canada for three months to organize their western networks.
00:13:50 Speaker 1
And my reply was very short.
00:13:53 Speaker 1
The hell with them I don’t want.
00:13:54 Speaker 1
To work for them.
00:13:55 Speaker 2
You are not in favor of the netball.
00:13:56 Speaker 1
Well, actually, no, I wasn’t because it was company policy not to.
00:14:02 Speaker 1
Not to.
00:14:04 Speaker 1
And as it turned out, their policy was quite in a sense, quite correct.
00:14:09 Speaker 1
They were doing very nicely. They weren’t making any money out of this little 500 Watt radio station.
00:14:15 Speaker 1
But good advertising for the current company, it was put in there as a matter of fact, to sell batteries, we used to have the A&B battery boys on the air and Bob Harvey.
00:14:28 Speaker 2
And they must have been been somewhat discomfited when Rogers brought out the battery was really.
00:14:33 Speaker 1
Yes, they were.
00:14:34 Speaker 1
Well, they got the the car.
00:14:36 Speaker 1
The company got rid of its batteries as a matter of fact, sold it off to another company.
00:14:39 Speaker 1
But anyway.
00:14:42 Speaker 1
Uh, Mr.
00:14:43 Speaker 1
Greg said.
00:14:44 Speaker 1
Well, you weren’t here to, to be consulted, so he said we agreed and we loaned it to them for three months.
00:14:54 Speaker 1
He said you better go or else I don’t know whether you have a job around here.
00:14:59 Speaker 2
No one ever explained it to.
00:15:00 Speaker 2
You like that before?
00:15:03 Speaker 1
Very, very fancy, very, very direct.
00:15:07 Speaker 1
And I think I learned about management and.
00:15:10 Speaker 1
Administration, I learned there.
00:15:13 Speaker 1
But out I went.
00:15:17 Speaker 1
And I was accompanied.
00:15:19 Speaker 1
On the whole trip by Rage, Brophy, who was then sales manager for the Marconi Company and part time by Mr.
00:15:27 Speaker 1
Maher who was the vice chairman of the Broadcasting Commission.
00:15:35 Speaker 1
Sorry, but I was at least all my auditioning.
00:15:40 Speaker 1
Notes are now down in the archive but.
00:15:48 Speaker 1
I think we auditioned something over.
00:15:52 Speaker 1
Oh, maybe 2003 thousand people.
00:15:56 Speaker 2
Or you’re doing hiring staff with the CRBC for their Western stations.
00:16:00 Speaker 1
No, we were working, of course the CRBC didn’t have any.
00:16:04 Speaker 1
So they had one station in in Vancouver.
00:16:07 Speaker 1
They’ll see in our state.
00:16:10 Speaker 1
But no, we were just auditioning talent.
00:16:14 Speaker 1
And arranging for the production of programs and all the Western cities right through Winnipeg to Victoria.
00:16:22 Speaker 2
I suppose you heard every singing group and every amateur and professional chorus and band.
00:16:28 Speaker 1
I would think so actually, but.
00:16:34 Speaker 1
I made notes on them all.
00:16:36 Speaker 1
I have a file.
00:16:37 Speaker 1
I guess that’s thick.
00:16:40 Speaker 1
And some of them turned out to be quite successful.
00:16:43 Speaker 1
Artists made names for themselves, others.
00:16:46 Speaker 1
I guess they disappeared into limbo.
00:16:48 Speaker 1
I don’t know.
00:16:50 Speaker 1
But when I came back in the autumn time of my hair tried to persuade me to join the CRBC organization and I said no, I don’t want to work for any government outfit.
00:17:02 Speaker 1
Right.
00:17:02 Speaker 2
If you would just to hang your bike on your hotel and you.
00:17:05 Speaker 1
Would forget about it.
00:17:06 Speaker 1
Maybe they swivels around.
00:17:10 Speaker 2
And you get both fair and squeeze.
00:17:14 Speaker 1
So I went back to my job.
00:17:17 Speaker 1
Sometime in early October, I guess it was.
00:17:24 Speaker 1
We’re quite happy there.
00:17:25 Speaker 1
Things were going along very well and suddenly.
00:17:46 Speaker 1
So I went back to my job sometime in early October.
00:17:51 Speaker 1
I guess it was.
00:17:56 Speaker 1
I was quite happy there things were going along very well and suddenly again.
00:18:05 Speaker 1
Greg got a call from Martha Steele.
00:18:07 Speaker 1
They said we want to see Bush in Ottawa tomorrow morning.
00:18:12 Speaker 1
And they called me down, told me that and they said what do they want now?
00:18:15 Speaker 1
He said I haven’t the faintest idea.
00:18:17 Speaker 1
It’s a better goal.
00:18:22 Speaker 1
I boarded the night train, came into Ottawa.
00:18:26 Speaker 1
7:00 o’clock in the morning.
00:18:28 Speaker 1
And Mr.
00:18:29 Speaker 1
EA Weir, Austin Weir.
00:18:36 Speaker 1
Even though he worked for the CRBC I.
00:18:38 Speaker 1
Was very fond of him.
00:18:40 Speaker 1
He I think deserves more credit than almost anyone else.
00:18:45 Speaker 1
Creating a.
00:18:48 Speaker 1
Devising and creating and having produced some of the best programs that ever went on the air for the CNR.
00:18:56 Speaker 1
And I respected him very much.
00:19:01 Speaker 1
So I called.
00:19:02 Speaker 1
Him and I just help him out alone.
00:19:03 Speaker 1
And he said Bush.
00:19:04 Speaker 1
What are you doing?
00:19:05 Speaker 1
And he said I don’t quite know, but.
00:19:08 Speaker 1
Arthur Steele, I told my boss to have me report to him at 10:00 o’clock this morning.
00:19:14 Speaker 1
He said.
00:19:15 Speaker 1
I think they’re going to offer you a job.
00:19:18 Speaker 1
And I said well.
00:19:20 Speaker 1
I’m not anxious to leave the job I have, but it will happen.
00:19:24 Speaker 1
I’d be very happy to work with you.
00:19:27 Speaker 1
And he said, well, I’m afraid you wouldn’t be working with me.
00:19:29 Speaker 1
They fired me yesterday.
00:19:31 Speaker 1
I said I won’t repeat it.
00:19:40 Speaker 1
So he said, well, where are you?
00:19:41 Speaker 1
He said him in the shadow.
00:19:42 Speaker 1
He said if he had breakfast, they said no.
00:19:44 Speaker 1
He said I’m coming right down.
00:19:45 Speaker 1
So we sat down and had breakfast.
00:19:48 Speaker 1
And Mr.
00:19:48 Speaker 1
Weir told me what they had done.
00:19:51 Speaker 1
And actually this has a rather.
00:19:54 Speaker 1
What shall I say?
00:19:57 Speaker 1
Even in those days of 1933.
00:20:01 Speaker 1
This question of French English.
00:20:04 Speaker 1
Was the body.
00:20:07 Speaker 1
What had happened was that Mister Weird had a bit of trouble.
00:20:10 Speaker 1
His wife had given birth to a baby who died or she died and he died, located with his sister down in Boston and.
00:20:18 Speaker 1
On the French side, they had a chat in the name of the artist coupon.
00:20:24 Speaker 1
Who eventually organized and owned CJD in Montreal.
00:20:31 Speaker 1
But art was very alert.
00:20:33 Speaker 1
He was a good program man and why I would know.
00:20:37 Speaker 1
He had very little.
00:20:38 Speaker 1
He was at CKC in Montreal as a salesman.
00:20:42 Speaker 1
But he was a hit.
00:20:45 Speaker 1
And he went out and organized quite a number of very fine programs from Montreal.
00:20:52 Speaker 1
And Mr.
00:20:53 Speaker 1
Weir, of course, was busy with some of his personal affairs.
00:20:57 Speaker 1
And what happened to us is that these programs in French coming out of what we all were finding music programs, but announced bilingually actually, but that didn’t satisfy the Frenchman, or at least the English speaking people out there and all hell broke loose.
00:21:12 Speaker 1
Not very much, except the degree it’s getting even worse.
00:21:14 Speaker 1
Right.
00:21:19 Speaker 1
You know.
00:21:20 Speaker 1
No, Sir.
00:21:21 Speaker 1
These plow jockeys out there, as they call Westerners, weren’t having any friends.
00:21:27 Speaker 1
So it got so bad that that they decided that Mister Weir wasn’t fulfilling their responsibilities.
00:21:34 Speaker 1
And they let him go.
00:21:36 Speaker 1
So I went down to see Colonel Seal.
00:21:38 Speaker 1
He told me what they wanted.
00:21:41 Speaker 1
And I told him, quite frankly, that I had a job tomorrow, that.
00:21:47 Speaker 1
Pleases me very much.
00:21:48 Speaker 1
The garden companies assigned company to work for well, they said.
00:21:52 Speaker 1
We’ve got to know within a week.
00:21:53 Speaker 1
We can go back and think it over, but let me know.
00:21:57 Speaker 1
Well, I went back and I told Mr.
00:21:59 Speaker 1
Drake what had happened.
00:22:02 Speaker 1
He’d rather long face, he said, well earning.
00:22:04 Speaker 1
I didn’t.
00:22:06 Speaker 1
Intend to tell you at the moment it’s very secretive.
00:22:12 Speaker 1
But he said, unfortunately our.
00:22:16 Speaker 1
Parent firm in the United States using the carbide.
00:22:20 Speaker 1
Has given us instructions to close down this station. As of December the 31st.
00:22:24 Speaker 2
Wasn’t making any money for them or.
00:22:26 Speaker 1
No, they just didn’t want to get into a tangle with the broadcasting authorities.
00:22:32 Speaker 1
Sorry, said Knight would stay with us in the advertising department and the sales department.
00:22:38 Speaker 1
But he said if you want to pursue your.
00:22:41 Speaker 1
Career and broadcasting.
00:22:42 Speaker 1
I suggest you give a serious thought.
00:22:46 Speaker 1
I went home and talked to my wife about it.
00:22:48 Speaker 1
We just bought a new house for the way in.
00:22:50 Speaker 2
In Toronto, isn’t that always the way?
00:22:52 Speaker 2
You know, going to?
00:22:53 Speaker 2
Buy a house and something around.
00:22:54 Speaker 1
Right, right.
00:22:56 Speaker 1
But within three or four days, I came to conclusion.
00:23:00 Speaker 1
Maybe I better take the job.
00:23:03 Speaker 1
I arrived down here on the second day of November and.
00:23:08 Speaker 1
Started with the CRBC on that date.
00:23:11 Speaker 2
What position did you have?
00:23:12 Speaker 1
Here I was.
00:23:15 Speaker 1
Well, actually the position that I had was just curious, part of The thing is that they’re not very curious, but that happens in the bureaucracy.
00:23:25 Speaker 1
I was a chief engineer.
00:23:28 Speaker 1
To me, if that was the position that I was assigned to because it was the only one that was open at that particular time, although they had a chief engineer going alive.
00:23:37 Speaker 1
Engineering background, I didn’t know microphone an amplifier really.
00:23:42 Speaker 1
I knew what a disc was in the turntable, but I was technical knowledge whatsoever.
00:23:48 Speaker 1
Still don’t.
00:23:51 Speaker 1
Very little.
00:23:53 Speaker 1
But that was the only position that was open, and so I took it at a reduced salary until they found a better one for me.
00:24:01 Speaker 1
And it took them over a year to do that.
00:24:03 Speaker 1
So dance here, these things still free money.
00:24:09 Speaker 1
Well, they started there and.
00:24:14 Speaker 1
Worked there then.
00:24:17 Speaker 1
Until the CRBC became the CBC.
00:24:21 Speaker 1
And I enjoyed it.
00:24:24 Speaker 1
Very much.
00:24:27 Speaker 1
I traveled across Canada several times each year organizing programs.
00:24:34 Speaker 1
And appointing people.
00:24:37 Speaker 1
Program positions, that sort of thing.
00:24:41 Speaker 1
And then came the CBC and Mr.
00:24:43 Speaker 1
Gladstone Murray and.
00:24:45 Speaker 1
Well, I did get into trouble over the.
00:24:48 Speaker 1
At one time over the Mr.
00:24:52 Speaker 1
Series that we put on the air.
00:24:54 Speaker 2
Did you get blamed for that?
00:24:56 Speaker 1
Well, I suppose I was where Hector Charles was.
00:24:58 Speaker 1
That’s the major part of the blade.
00:25:00 Speaker 1
He wasn’t really.
00:25:01 Speaker 1
Didn’t know what was going on.
00:25:02 Speaker 1
He played Frank about it.
00:25:04 Speaker 1
But this was in the election of, what, 30?
00:25:08 Speaker 2
Five when the Conservatives.
00:25:10 Speaker 1
Were defeated in the Liberal unity.
00:25:13 Speaker 1
And we got an inquiry from an advertising agency.
00:25:18 Speaker 1
Mind you, I was pretty naive politically at that time and still am, I guess but.
00:25:26 Speaker 1
This was a an agency that was known as a Tory agency and they applied for the CRBC was still taking commercial programs at that time.
00:25:38 Speaker 1
They applied for time 15 minutes a week for 13 weeks to put on a series to be written by the agency or somebody in the agency.
00:25:48 Speaker 1
Called Mr. sage.
00:25:50 Speaker 1
I saw the first script and sure it was a satire, but it struck me as being very.
00:25:56 Speaker 1
Humor to tell you the truth.
00:26:01 Speaker 1
I let it go on and engage the artists work.
00:26:04 Speaker 1
And all hell broke loose after the first program in the 1st 15 minutes.
00:26:13 Speaker 1
I think that was the main reason why Mr.
00:26:15 Speaker 1
Charles has lost his job because of the parliamentary committee after that.
00:26:20 Speaker 2
Liberals weren’t very happy with Tory propaganda.
00:26:23 Speaker 1
Oh well, no.
00:26:25 Speaker 1
And actually it was modified.
00:26:28 Speaker 1
The second script was.
00:26:31 Speaker 1
Less blatant than the first one.
00:26:38 Speaker 1
We were hauled before this parliamentary committee and Mr.
00:26:41 Speaker 1
Charlie was had to take most of the blame and the.
00:26:45 Speaker 1
Short term, this contract and got over that from Murray.
00:26:50 Speaker 2
Blackstone worry was the prodigy.
00:26:52 Speaker 2
I feel like at that time of the the cloth spray move was he not going radially?
00:26:56 Speaker 1
That’s right.
00:26:58 Speaker 1
More plant than dream.
00:27:00 Speaker 1
Have you talked to gram?
00:27:01 Speaker 1
Gram spry?
00:27:02 Speaker 1
You should.
00:27:05 Speaker 1
He’s not too well at the moment and.
00:27:11 Speaker 1
But he’s he’s writing his memoirs now, and for the archives.
00:27:16 Speaker 1
But Alan flaunt.
00:27:18 Speaker 1
And I am a little reluctant to say this, but.
00:27:23 Speaker 1
I believe it to be.
00:27:26 Speaker 1
I believe it to be the case.
00:27:29 Speaker 1
Alan Plant was responsible for bringing Gladstone, Murray Ozier.
00:27:33 Speaker 1
No doubt about it.
00:27:35 Speaker 1
And I think dream and.
00:27:40 Speaker 1
While grain particularly fell in line.
00:27:43 Speaker 1
Because Alan had put up all the money.
00:27:46 Speaker 1
Or the Canadian Radio League.
00:27:55 Speaker 1
Murray came out, they brought him out on a tour of Canada to report.
00:28:02 Speaker 1
On the state of broadcasting in Canada.
00:28:05 Speaker 1
And obviously he knew what they were up to.
00:28:08 Speaker 1
Canadian Radio league.
00:28:10 Speaker 1
And he wrote his report accordingly, recommending that a change be made in the direction of the national radio system.
00:28:21 Speaker 1
And I guess.
00:28:24 Speaker 1
Being a Canadian, he thought he would like to return to Canada.
00:28:27 Speaker 1
Yeah, there’s no doubt about it, but the I would think that the deal was made on that trip between Murray and.
00:28:36 Speaker 1
And Alan Plant, we worked very closely as a matter of fact, when Mr.
00:28:40 Speaker 1
McKenzie came, by the way.
00:28:47 Speaker 1
Mr. Murray came out as general manager, Doctor Frigo’s, assistant general manager in 1936 and.
00:29:01 Speaker 1
You got along very well.
00:29:03 Speaker 1
He had the.
00:29:05 Speaker 1
Put in writing, I am quite sure.
00:29:08 Speaker 1
Well, I’ve never seen the letter that he.
00:29:15 Speaker 1
Was known as a matter of fact was having.
00:29:18 Speaker 1
Right.
00:29:21 Speaker 1
Taking the odd drink.
00:29:23 Speaker 1
Right.
00:29:23 Speaker 1
Or two for not the odd drink, but the drink too frequently.
00:29:27 Speaker 1
And he made a commitment to.
00:29:32 Speaker 1
Plants and others that you quit thinking.
00:29:39 Speaker 1
Although I happen to know that on this trip across the Prairie.
00:29:50 Speaker 1
The chap there was Bill Graham, CCN.
00:29:54 Speaker 1
We loaded a case of whiskey in its compartment in the train.
00:29:58 Speaker 1
On the way back with this tour, and there wasn’t a heck of a lot of it left at the time you get back to Ottawa.
00:30:05 Speaker 1
But anyway, that was long distance.
00:30:08 Speaker 1
Yeah, that was in the.
00:30:12 Speaker 1
Spring I guess is.
00:30:14 Speaker 1
36.
00:30:16 Speaker 1
And away Mr.
00:30:17 Speaker 1
Murray came out.
00:30:19 Speaker 1
Canada, the general manager and we got along extremely well.
00:30:37 Speaker 1
For Terry and Western Canada, and I said you can’t.
00:30:42 Speaker 1
Back in the Maritimes, yeah.
00:30:45 Speaker 2
Largely in English. French, yeah.
00:30:50 Speaker 1
Well, art was very able program organizer.
00:30:57 Speaker 1
We had in those early days of the of the CBC, and indeed the CRBC.
00:31:04 Speaker 1
What I would call some excellent programs.
00:31:09 Speaker 1
We had one coming from Montreal called one hour with you.
00:31:14 Speaker 1
And three of the really fine French Canadian vocalist, the trio.
00:31:22 Speaker 1
They had to find orchestra there and they’d find bands down there.
00:31:30 Speaker 1
But we produced day clothes and most standing programs.
00:31:35 Speaker 1
In the very early days of the CRBC.
00:31:38 Speaker 1
Then, of course, when Mr.
00:31:39 Speaker 1
Murray came in and after a year, he decided that in order to retain an audience.
00:31:44 Speaker 1
That we would have to bring in some American programs, which we did.
00:31:49 Speaker 1
Lux, Radio Theater, Avis Nandy, things like that.
00:31:56 Speaker 1
I’m trying to condense this as much as possible.
00:32:01 Speaker 1
And became apparent that the.
00:32:04 Speaker 1
That Mister Murray had the.
00:32:08 Speaker 1
It’s long by the wayside on some occasions.
00:32:11 Speaker 1
I was with him on Thursday.
00:32:12 Speaker 1
He was tripped and I know what went on.
00:32:17 Speaker 1
Pretty hard.
00:32:18 Speaker 1
As a matter of fact, if you.
00:32:20 Speaker 1
If you do any drinking not to get involved in some rather raucous parties in Western Canada, they’re the damndest people in the world.
00:32:28 Speaker 1
They they kill you with kindness.
00:32:33 Speaker 1
And the way that became known.
00:32:36 Speaker 1
And then the war came on.
00:32:39 Speaker 1
Alan, of course.
00:32:42 Speaker 1
Was a.
00:32:43 Speaker 1
He was an Archers graduate.
00:32:47 Speaker 1
I don’t know whether anything over there happened that.
00:32:51 Speaker 1
In my opinion at least.
00:32:53 Speaker 1
Soured him on the British people.
00:32:59 Speaker 1
The war came on and.
00:33:02 Speaker 1
Gladstone Murray.
00:33:05 Speaker 1
No question in my mind.
00:33:07 Speaker 1
Well, as a matter of fact, I.
00:33:08 Speaker 1
Know this to be the case.
00:33:13 Speaker 1
Murray got mixed up with Stephenson down in New York.
00:33:17 Speaker 2
The man called Intrepid.
00:33:19 Speaker 1
That’s right.
00:33:20 Speaker 1
I haven’t read it yet.
00:33:21 Speaker 1
It must get it at least.
00:33:27 Speaker 2
There’s another Steve.
00:33:28 Speaker 1
Yeah, that’s right.
00:33:30 Speaker 2
It’s hard to know when people were talking about all these super secret things move right through the man called Intrepid.
00:33:35 Speaker 2
There was another book dealing with much of the same material, and they they disagree substantially in detail, but anyway you’re thinking.
00:33:43 Speaker 1
Anyway, as you may recall, I mean, Mr.
00:33:48 Speaker 1
Mackenzie King wasn’t too kindly disposed towards the war, British or any, and Alan plant was his disciples.
00:33:56 Speaker 1
No doubt about.
00:33:58 Speaker 1
So once this became.
00:34:01 Speaker 1
I I think it became apparent to quite a number of people that Mister Murray was on his frequent trips to New York was certainly seeing somebody down there.
00:34:12 Speaker 1
I think that’s when Helen.
00:34:13 Speaker 1
Really took this country to.
00:34:15 Speaker 1
And from there on in, they actually decided that they’d have to get rid of.
00:34:20 Speaker 2
Seemed to be an awful lot of power for one man to have.
00:34:23 Speaker 2
I keep getting this story about, you know, the name that he means, I suppose, because he’s still alive as Williams cry and and you don’t so often hear about I’m alone.
00:34:32 Speaker 2
But I’m gathering more and more as I go along.
00:34:35 Speaker 2
That was really the power of the political power.
00:34:41 Speaker 1
No doubt about it.
00:34:49 Speaker 1
I I have reason to believe after the war, or at least then during the early part of the war we had a chat in.
00:34:58 Speaker 1
In Montreal.
00:35:00 Speaker 1
Who was program director there, Rooney Pelke.
00:35:05 Speaker 1
And on the day.
00:35:09 Speaker 1
Canada’s participation in the war was announced.
00:35:14 Speaker 1
Rooney just took everything off the top of his desk.
00:35:18 Speaker 1
That was all put away.
00:35:20 Speaker 1
And no one heard of him.
00:35:24 Speaker 1
For almost.
00:35:25 Speaker 1
A year?
00:35:27 Speaker 1
He disappeared from the face of the Earth.
00:35:31 Speaker 1
And of course, great many people thought he’d gone into hiding or something like that, that he would oppose the war and being a French lawyer brought up here in Ottawa, the father and mother were fine people in Ottawa’s father worked for the government.
00:35:45 Speaker 1
And Rooney was completely bilingual and very fine young man.
00:35:51 Speaker 1
As I say.
00:35:53 Speaker 1
No one saw heard.
00:35:56 Speaker 1
Of him or about him?
00:35:59 Speaker 1
Until I went to the BBC in 19.
00:36:08 Speaker 1
Any part of.
00:36:10 Speaker 1
No, I guess I would.
00:36:11 Speaker 1
It wasn’t the early part of 40.
00:36:16 Speaker 1
I went over with organize our own reporting unit.
00:36:23 Speaker 1
Came back and in the spring of 40.
00:36:30 Speaker 1
It may have been at that time I got a cable from Mr.
00:36:32 Speaker 1
Murray asking me if I could.
00:36:34 Speaker 1
Find a job for Rooney, Pelser.
00:36:37 Speaker 1
We’ve been not.
00:36:39 Speaker 1
I haven’t the faintest notion.
00:36:41 Speaker 1
I didn’t ask.
00:36:43 Speaker 1
I found a job for them.
00:36:44 Speaker 1
There they were.
00:36:44 Speaker 1
Glad to have him.
00:36:46 Speaker 2
That 1940, the Bob Bowman stories and the the overseas unit that really was the beginning of a serious news service with the CBC.
00:36:56 Speaker 1
Oh yeah, sure.
00:36:58 Speaker 1
Have you read the Bert polyps?
00:37:00 Speaker 2
That’s one another.
00:37:01 Speaker 2
One of the things that started, I read the book and my gosh, that was to be a radio program, not a book because the voices, most of the people yourself and Bowen, I guess our homes is dead.
00:37:16 Speaker 2
And Peter Stewart with all these people that are alone and we set them down in the studio and said, OK, let’s talk about what you did.
00:37:24 Speaker 1
It would have made it fantastic.
00:37:27 Speaker 2
This this is really what really was for the last thing that kicked me over because I’m sitting here crying because I can’t hear that.
00:37:35 Speaker 2
But I I’ve also wondered there again there are two versions of the Peter Stursberg version.
00:37:39 Speaker 2
One there’s the Poly version.
00:37:43 Speaker 2
All he says is that Bowman went down and he was directed at that time.
00:37:47 Speaker 2
I believe under your direction to record.
00:37:52 Speaker 2
Material with the troops at the harbor and then to come back to Toronto.
00:37:56 Speaker 2
But instead of that, he got on the.
00:37:57 Speaker 2
Ship and went over.
00:38:01 Speaker 1
It’s partly correct, actually the what happened was the breakdown communication.
00:38:07 Speaker 1
And the commander of the flotilla that was going over refused to let him on board.
00:38:13 Speaker 1
And he got in touch with me and we started.
00:38:15 Speaker 1
The wires at least.
00:38:16 Speaker 1
The the business going at this end and.
00:38:19 Speaker 1
He and art.
00:38:21 Speaker 1
The heart didn’t get there at.
00:38:23 Speaker 1
The same time Bob did.
00:38:25 Speaker 1
But he and he art finally got.
00:38:28 Speaker 1
On board ship.
00:38:28 Speaker 2
So the intention all along was to go over. It struck me when I first met Paul’s book that I could see a young woman down this thing. He wouldn’t be great if I could get overseas and getting on.
00:38:32 Speaker 1
Oh yeah.
00:38:38 Speaker 2
And then telling you.
00:38:39 Speaker 1
And it definitely planned that he he was getting on the ship but the.
00:38:44 Speaker 1
The Admiral, wherever he was, I’ve forgotten now.
00:38:47 Speaker 1
But no dice.
00:38:48 Speaker 1
You’re not coming onboard my ship.
00:38:50 Speaker 2
Well, that was quite an undertaking because these the.
00:38:54 Speaker 1
Cortana, tell him I call him back.
00:38:57 Speaker 2
The recording instruments were very bulky.
00:38:59 Speaker 1
And in power.
00:39:00 Speaker 2
And not intended to be ported in.
00:39:00 Speaker 1
Yeah. No, no.
00:39:10 Speaker 1
Well, anyway, Bob got on the way.
00:39:12 Speaker 1
He went and then I went over and I guess January.
00:39:17 Speaker 1
40 and we stayed there.
00:39:20 Speaker 1
I know until after Easter.
00:39:25 Speaker 1
It was a very exciting time.
00:39:29 Speaker 1
And why in the world they ever asked me to go back to the BBC?
00:39:33 Speaker 1
I don’t know.
00:39:34 Speaker 1
But they did.
00:39:35 Speaker 1
And I was seconded to the BBC then for about a year less than a year, I guess, until Mr.
00:39:42 Speaker 1
Murray called me home.
00:39:45
Right.
00:39:46 Speaker 1
Nine months, something like that.
00:39:48 Speaker 2
What are you doing with them?
00:39:49 Speaker 2
Coordinating or developing reporting?
00:39:52 Speaker 1
Well, actually, while I wasn’t entirely responsible.
00:39:58 Speaker 1
I was.
00:40:00 Speaker 1
I was.
00:40:02
OK.
00:40:02 Speaker 1
Engaged to coordinate and.
00:40:09 Speaker 1
That, shall I say, originate and try to produce.
00:40:13 Speaker 1
Have produced programs for North America on the International Shortwave service, and I must admit that that I was an odd character to take on that job, because what I did about these politics and that sort of thing next to nothing.
00:40:35 Speaker 1
I think the main reason for them asking me to come back.
00:40:41 Speaker 1
Was that when I was there with the war reporting unit?
00:40:46 Speaker 1
I got things done.
00:40:51 Speaker 1
Being a very direct and probably blunt sort of person, I and I got to know Mr.
00:40:57 Speaker 1
who became Sir JB Clark.
00:41:01 Speaker 1
I got to know him quite well, and the chapter the name of Tony Randall, who had been, as he called it to America several times, and I used to say it isn’t Americas, the United States.
00:41:10 Speaker 1
The hell with you in America.
00:41:14 Speaker 1
But Tony and I became very good friends and he was very helpful.
00:41:17 Speaker 1
And so was the JD.
00:41:21 Speaker 1
And I guess it was my direct approach to things and they they they weren’t very successful in getting there.
00:41:27 Speaker 1
A message across to the United States.
00:41:30 Speaker 1
Through their own facility.
00:41:33 Speaker 1
And I guess that’s why they asked me to come back.
00:41:38 Speaker 1
I think if you’ve read the book, you you you recall the incident where I took over the the soap script.
00:41:48 Speaker 1
Make a Long story short, that was the beginning of the.
00:41:52 Speaker 1
And the British family, Robin.
00:41:55 Speaker 1
Which was put on shortwave and some of the scribes in the newspaper shared it on shortwave and suggested that this would be a good thing to carry.
00:42:05 Speaker 1
And the United States and the United Kingdom and a lot.
00:42:07 Speaker 2
Well, that time they didn’t have some terrible things with soap operas at the BBC.
00:42:12 Speaker 1
Well, actually I remember taking it.
00:42:14 Speaker 1
I I thought it was a form of drama and I took it, took the scripts to the head of the drama section.
00:42:27 Speaker 1
No way would they put any, any, any any material like that was a drama, but I was advised to take it to the variety department and Archie Harding.
00:42:37 Speaker 1
One of these very.
00:42:40 Speaker 1
Right.
00:42:45 Speaker 1
Kindly Englishman and listen to my story and I left him the script I had piled them, but then.
00:42:53 Speaker 1
And quite amused at the idea.
00:42:57 Speaker 1
He thought maybe it was the drama people who should be doing it, but he it wasn’t real drama after all night entertainment, I suppose.
00:43:09 Speaker 1
And about 2 weeks later I got a.
00:43:12 Speaker 1
Call from Mark.
00:43:15 Speaker 1
He said Mr.
00:43:15 Speaker 1
Bush well, the only thing that I find difficult about this, he said that it might be acceptable in the United States.
00:43:23 Speaker 1
But he said, I really don’t know who you get the right such stuff.
00:43:28 Speaker 1
And while I said actually there must be someone here who could write it.
00:43:34 Speaker 1
There is a format.
00:43:36 Speaker 1
And it’s in English.
00:43:38 Speaker 1
So what you’ve got good actors and actresses get a storyline together.
00:43:43 Speaker 1
So Archie dug around and he finally found the young chap Alan.
00:43:50 Speaker 1
It became quite a playwright.
00:43:54 Speaker 1
Alan Nelson, actually.
00:43:56 Speaker 1
And he and I, I sat with Scott.
00:44:01 Speaker 1
Buyer one day at noon.
00:44:03 Speaker 1
Listening to the shelling going on.
00:44:07 Speaker 1
And now and said, well, he didn’t know whether he could write it, but he’s great prepared to take a whack at it.
00:44:12 Speaker 1
So that’s how the British family Robinson started.
00:44:16 Speaker 1
Well, it it was on shortwave.
00:44:18 Speaker 1
It was carried by, I think 50 some odd stations in the United States and the stations here in Canada and CBC station.
00:44:28 Speaker 1
And it became very popular in the United Kingdom when it ran for 18 years.
00:44:33 Speaker 1
So only two or three years since they’ve gone since they discontinued it.
00:44:39 Speaker 1
So I stayed there then with them and.
00:44:43 Speaker 1
Throughout the early war years with art homes and Bob Bowman.
00:44:52 Speaker 1
I can’t say that I I enjoyed my work, but I can’t.
00:44:56 Speaker 1
I’d be.
00:44:57 Speaker 1
Less than truthful.
00:44:58 Speaker 1
I I said that I enjoyed the bombing part of it.
00:45:02 Speaker 1
But yeah, it was an interesting period of night.
00:45:08 Speaker 1
I was very fond of the British people that tended to.
00:45:12 Speaker 1
Incidentally, going back several years, I went over to 19.
00:45:18 Speaker 1
36 I guess it was 3637 and Mr. Murray sent me over to.
00:45:25 Speaker 1
The United Kingdom and to Europe.
00:45:28 Speaker 1
At that time, they were thinking of building new studios in Toronto and he wanted me to see the studios.
00:45:34 Speaker 1
Maybe wanted to get rid of me for a while.
00:45:36 Speaker 1
I don’t know.
00:45:36 Speaker 1
But anyway, I went over there and just before the war broke out.
00:45:42 Speaker 1
And went to the United Kingdom and France and Germany.
00:45:53 Speaker 1
That is the year before there were 38, yeah.
00:46:00 Speaker 1
I was known to the BBC people at that time.
00:46:06 Speaker 1
I came back.
00:46:08 Speaker 1
1940.
00:46:11 Speaker 1
And again became second to do another outfit.
00:46:17 Speaker 1
The more information board.
00:46:22 Speaker 1
That was one of the most.
00:46:27 Speaker 1
Periods of my life, I believe I.
00:46:30 Speaker 2
What what would be your job there?
00:46:31 Speaker 1
Well, they brought in and again my name escapes me but brought in an advertising agency man and Charlie.
00:46:43 Speaker 1
With his name anyway, who was quoted a well known journalist.
00:46:48 Speaker 1
And they set up this board.
00:46:51 Speaker 1
We were located in the It’s now the.
00:46:55 Speaker 1
The Superior Court.
00:47:00 Speaker 1
I was nicknamed Desire Radio and I said now look, I don’t want to hear any.
00:47:05 Speaker 1
I don’t wanna hear that repeated desire.
00:47:09 Speaker 1
I’ve been here to do a job.
00:47:12 Speaker 1
Well, we used to meet with committee after committee and Walter Gordon had another.
00:47:20 Speaker 1
And water and Donald.
Part 2:
Transcript
00:00:02 Speaker 1
I had known wintermantel in my early days at CCMC.
00:00:06 Speaker 1
Got him out of a hole one time when he was manager.
00:00:10 Speaker 1
Downtown bank, the Bank of Nova Scotia for one of my employees, got into them for about $3000 over the overdraft.
00:00:18 Speaker 2
And being great, claims Donald Gordon.
00:00:20 Speaker 2
Once you were describing two quarters where the great players.
00:00:23 Speaker 1
They did. Oh, yeah. But it was Donald’s first life. As a matter of fact, and regarded herself as a bit of an off.
00:00:31 Speaker 1
And this chap Big Bill Campbell did his banking at the head office, the Bank of Nova Scotia and flew.
00:00:37 Speaker 2
When she was up again.
00:00:40 Speaker 1
Well, I think he’s one of the great characters of all time, really.
00:00:46 Speaker 1
That time, actually, Bill Campbell, believe it or not.
00:00:50 Speaker 1
And this was at CCNC, and Bill Campbell was, I don’t say earning but.
00:00:55 Speaker 1
Drawing down around somewhere between 25 and $30,000 a year.
00:01:01 Speaker 1
Yeah, really was.
00:01:03 Speaker 1
But he was spending 40.
00:01:07 Speaker 1
The sheriff has always done as he is.
00:01:11 Speaker 1
And I’ve seen me take Bill into the studio and he was half as big again as I and put him up against that wall and say, look, you son of a so and so and *******.
00:01:21 Speaker 1
If you don’t sober up, I’m going to fire you.
00:01:24 Speaker 1
I’m going to throw you right out of this studio.
00:01:28 Speaker 1
But he was one of the greatest salesman I ever saw.
00:01:33 Speaker 1
Well, he started this year.
00:01:35 Speaker 1
Breakfast hour.
00:01:38 Speaker 1
Which ran for some five years on network.
00:01:41 Speaker 1
Big Bill Campbell.
00:01:45 Speaker 1
I don’t know whether it still appears as a matter of fact in the SURE product, but I think it still does.
00:01:51 Speaker 1
A jar of gold and sunshine.
00:01:55 Speaker 1
Still, this bad lived that lived that one morning and they took it up as a slogan that existed on the labels of the.
00:02:01 Speaker 1
Orange marmalade for years and years and years until this year is filled out, incidentally annoys me at the advertising that was arms of the sheriff at the moment.
00:02:10 Speaker 1
If you listen carefully, you’ll hear them pronounce the sheriff.
00:02:14 Speaker 1
There’s the sheriff.
00:02:14 Speaker 1
That surely always was.
00:02:19 Speaker 1
But anyway, that’s another story.
00:02:21 Speaker 1
But Bill, after I left.
00:02:24 Speaker 1
Go to the CRBC.
00:02:27 Speaker 1
They’ll discover that he’d had a war wound from which he’d never been able to persuade them to.
00:02:33 Speaker 1
Gives attention for it.
00:02:35 Speaker 1
So he.
00:02:38 Speaker 1
Shrapnel was in his leg.
00:02:39 Speaker 1
He finally applied for pension.
00:02:42 Speaker 1
And was given a 5% pension.
00:02:46 Speaker 1
This is the.
00:02:50 Speaker 1
First door yes, 1718.
00:02:55 Speaker 1
Collected some $3000.
00:02:59 Speaker 1
He’s been married in England during the war, had a son over there like.
00:03:03 Speaker 1
But he decided to go back.
00:03:06 Speaker 1
And shortly after I joined the CRBC here in Ottawa, he walked into my office one day and said, well, Mr.
00:03:13 Speaker 1
Bush, I’m going to England.
00:03:17 Speaker 1
So I said, what are you going to do there?
00:03:18 Speaker 1
He said.
00:03:18 Speaker 1
I don’t know.
00:03:20 Speaker 1
They said Bill, have you got any money because Bill was always dead?
00:03:23 Speaker 1
He said.
00:03:25 Speaker 1
They collected this pension over $3000 and he pulled out a roll of bills and choked a horse.
00:03:31 Speaker 1
And there it is.
00:03:38 Speaker 1
Some six weeks later.
00:03:41 Speaker 1
I was ensconced in an office.
00:03:45 Speaker 1
National Research building.
00:03:50 Speaker 1
We used to carry the DBC.
00:03:55 Speaker 1
Programs between 3:00 and 4:00 o’clock in the afternoon.
00:03:59 Speaker 1
And much to my amazement, one day.
00:04:02 Speaker 1
I hear an announcement like this.
00:04:06 Speaker 1
This is the BBC’s Big Bill Campbell and his rocky Mountaineers.
00:04:13 Speaker 1
He’s the only man that I know.
00:04:15 Speaker 1
Whoever persuaded to put on a program or a series of programs and under four weeks time he assembled the musician.
00:04:26 Speaker 1
Put the thing on.
00:04:28 Speaker 1
And that lasted for years, and Bill retired dead.
00:04:30 Speaker 1
Now Bill retired as the most respectable person head of the Guild.
00:04:37 Speaker 1
Over there, the Actors Guild.
00:04:40 Speaker 1
And very well, all.
00:04:46 Speaker 1
That was part of the Big Little Campbell story.
00:04:49 Speaker 2
You had organized to helped organize the Royal Tour 2 in 1939. Yeah, but in those days, trying to get the particularly getting the lines together, they’re getting the equipment.
00:05:00 Speaker 1
Yes, it was.
00:05:01 Speaker 1
I I.
00:05:02 Speaker 1
But I had the good cooperation from the.
00:05:06 Speaker 1
Technical side Gordon all over the chief engineer.
00:05:12 Speaker 1
I was under the.
00:05:15 Speaker 1
As a matter of fact of Mr.
00:05:19 Speaker 1
Well, I think was the greatest public relations man this country has ever seen.
00:05:22 Speaker 1
He worked with Canadian National League.
00:05:25 Speaker 1
And it is he again.
00:05:28 Speaker 1
Asked to have me some condoms to this organization.
00:05:32 Speaker 1
And this happened.
00:05:34 Speaker 1
He went with me on that one.
00:05:36 Speaker 1
And we worked over there with Thompson for a little good, see much prior to the Royal Tour, got things lined up.
00:05:45 Speaker 1
And then.
00:05:47 Speaker 1
Excuse me, I think there’s one other things you can say about the season season.
00:05:52 Speaker 1
And when they run up against anything like that, a a monumental job of organization that they’ve come through pretty darn well.
00:06:01 Speaker 1
Sure, the most recent.
00:06:04 Speaker 1
But it’s a big challenge and they they do.
00:06:06 Speaker 1
It extremely well.
00:06:08 Speaker 1
No one has ever heard me criticize the CBC as a national system.
00:06:13 Speaker 1
I became very fascinated with it and it’s subjective.
00:06:17 Speaker 1
And I.
00:06:20 Speaker 1
I’m quite convinced with unless technology technological change makes it.
00:06:27 Speaker 1
Difficult and even.
00:06:31 Speaker 1
I don’t think this is likely to happen, but there’ll always be CBC in this country.
00:06:35 Speaker 1
It’s it’s roots are far too deep in the soil of the country that you hear some of these people saying, oh, we better get rid of it.
00:06:41 Speaker 1
It’s too costly and so on.
00:06:42 Speaker 1
You won’t.
00:06:43 Speaker 2
Your problems mainly were appear to stem from management, or really from the lack of it and your interest or in programming, and that you either got too much or too little direction depending on.
00:06:54 Speaker 1
Who? I got too little.
00:06:57 Speaker 1
I got too little to be quite frank about it.
00:06:59 Speaker 1
Looking back on it now.
00:07:03 Speaker 1
Mr. Murray.
00:07:07 Speaker 1
Essentially a programmed man, he understood.
00:07:10 Speaker 1
Doctor Freegal was a technician.
00:07:12 Speaker 1
He was an administrator and an engineer.
00:07:17 Speaker 1
And I didn’t have I I’m very fond of the the Doctor doctor figure.
00:07:21 Speaker 1
He’s a very fine man.
00:07:25 Speaker 1
But once Mr. Murray went.
00:07:33 Speaker 1
I just had the doctor Frigon eventually took over his general manager and Donald Manson, the assistant general manager.
00:07:41 Speaker 1
I had to make far too many decisions on my own.
00:07:46 Speaker 1
I can recall when we moved back to Toronto in 19.
00:07:52 Speaker 1
3838.
00:07:58 Speaker 1
I I remember coming.
00:07:59 Speaker 1
I used to come to Ottawa every week, every two weeks.
00:08:02 Speaker 1
Come down here when I had a problem or even talk long distance and talk to Mr.
00:08:07 Speaker 1
Manson or something like that and.
00:08:10 Speaker 1
Say, what are we going to do about this?
00:08:11 Speaker 1
Well, Bush, you know, you’re the program director.
00:08:14 Speaker 1
You, you, you do what you like.
00:08:17 Speaker 1
Well, that’s a pretty heavy load of responsibility to put on fairly young shoulders.
00:08:25 Speaker 1
Doctor Freegard didn’t interfere with the program.
00:08:29 Speaker 1
And certainly Donald didn’t, and I had the greatest affection for Don Manson.
00:08:34 Speaker 1
He was a great little Scott.
00:08:36 Speaker 1
And certainly was one of the.
00:08:40 Speaker 1
Pacemakers and he and Alan Alan Flotter originally were very good friends, but they felt like.
00:08:48 Speaker 2
Early in the war? Pardon.
00:08:57 Speaker 1
I’ve never read his papers.
00:08:59 Speaker 1
They’re down there, but someday I must go down to the art type and see what he had to say.
00:09:04 Speaker 1
Right.
00:09:09 Speaker 1
We got through the war.
00:09:11 Speaker 1
I I spent some time over there with the BBC and then I went back on several occasions and with the war reporting unit.
00:09:21 Speaker 1
I I think a great deal of credit is due to Bob Bowman, who Bob was a bit of a curious character.
00:09:28 Speaker 1
Bob applied for the.
00:09:29 Speaker 1
Job of general manager after Murray was fired and.
00:09:34 Speaker 1
He wasn’t.
00:09:36 Speaker 1
Receptable, apparently the Board of Governors.
00:09:39 Speaker 1
And he laughed.
00:09:44 Speaker 1
Bob was a pretty good broadcaster.
00:09:50 Speaker 1
People he got along well with staff up to a point.
00:09:54 Speaker 1
Bob is a.
00:09:56 Speaker 1
I must say that he’s got a fair measure of complete in this.
00:10:02 Speaker 1
He was spoiled, like a lot of young.
00:10:05 Speaker 1
When I was one of them, to be quite frank about young broadcasters will just start getting letters and phone calls telling you how good you are.
00:10:12 Speaker 1
You know your head expands, you begin to believe it and you get a bigger hat.
00:10:16 Speaker 1
And that’s what happened to Bob when he became the announcer for the hockey games in England before the war.
00:10:23 Speaker 1
He was an idol over there at that time.
00:10:25 Speaker 1
Bob Bowman.
00:10:26 Speaker 1
That’s why we sent Bob back in with the to organize the war news reporting team because he was well known there.
00:10:39 Speaker 1
But a lot of credit is given to Dan McCarthy McCarthy for Polly and people like that, and the engineers are at home.
00:10:55 Speaker 1
They did a fine job in in my opinion.
00:10:58 Speaker 2
So first of all, this is a brand new form of a reporting brand new form of you know and the equipment they they’ve almost had to design the equipment from the ground up.
00:11:07 Speaker 1
They did, yes, the the old, the old truck that they had.
00:11:12 Speaker 1
Betsy, I can remember.
00:11:15 Speaker 1
Driving down it one night, feeling normal, driving in it one night done accurately and feeling no particularly pain.
00:11:22 Speaker 1
We’ve been ordered the parties.
00:11:23 Speaker 1
Some glasses.
00:11:24 Speaker 1
Please talk in the morning.
00:11:27 Speaker 1
This thing rattling along, but it was it was built almost a solid steel.
00:11:32 Speaker 1
Very difficult for bullets or anything to penetrate.
00:11:36 Speaker 1
That’s cumbersome.
00:11:39 Speaker 1
And it unfortunately burned up the last day of the war with an engineer, one of our engineers and.
00:11:47 Speaker 2
I thought Betsy King two war with it.
00:11:50 Speaker 1
So I’m told I’ve never seen it.
00:11:52 Speaker 1
I’ve never.
00:11:52 Speaker 1
Heard of this thing?
00:11:54 Speaker 1
But it was.
00:11:55 Speaker 1
Bert could put you straight on that.
00:11:58 Speaker 1
But Jack Cannon was another one who was over there in Jackson, Toronto, I think.
00:12:03 Speaker 1
No, I think he’s alive.
00:12:07 Speaker 1
They did.
00:12:08 Speaker 1
They all did good jobs.
00:12:11 Speaker 2
But what became of you employed the lighter part in the end of the war, you came back to Canada.
00:12:16 Speaker 1
Came back to Canada, then went to this information board, stayed there for six months, came back and the the CBC and.
00:12:27 Speaker 1
Carried on as Director General of Programs, I guess.
00:12:37 Speaker 1
I enjoyed it.
00:12:38 Speaker 1
Doctor Fregon, I had a little.
00:12:43 Speaker 1
Bit of difficulty for a while getting along some idiot on the the plan that during the war as a matter of fact that some very was forced to resign.
00:12:55 Speaker 1
Any ladders?
00:12:57 Speaker 1
But I don’t know what year would be.
00:12:58 Speaker 1
When was it being that this happened?
00:13:03 Speaker 1
He was kicked upstairs.
00:13:12 Speaker 2
Problems here?
00:13:15 Speaker 1
Well, Doctor Fregon, I’ve always gotten along very well.
00:13:19 Speaker 1
But again, the Board of Governors Matt and.
00:13:26 Speaker 1
Decided that this was number time to appoint a French Canadian as general manager of the corporation during wartime.
00:13:35 Speaker 1
The conscription battle is on, and that sort of thing.
00:13:39 Speaker 1
Saw three of them.
00:13:42 Speaker 1
And we should not name.
00:13:44 Speaker 1
I don’t know whether the living or dead.
00:13:47 Speaker 1
Decided that Tony Bushnell should become general manager.
00:13:50 Speaker 1
I think this is one of the most embarrassing moments of my life.
00:13:55 Speaker 1
When this was embarrassing at that time on a Sunday, I was called to my office in Toronto.
00:14:03 Speaker 1
By one of the members of the board and, said Bush.
00:14:06 Speaker 1
We just can’t let this fellow free God become.
00:14:08 Speaker 1
General manager and we want you appointed and they said no, wait a minute.
00:14:12 Speaker 1
No deal, no dice.
00:14:14 Speaker 1
Nothing with the kind.
00:14:16 Speaker 1
This will create real trouble in the sea.
00:14:21 Speaker 1
No, they were determined.
00:14:24 Speaker 1
So they said we want you to report to the Board of Governors meeting tomorrow morning at 10:00 o’clock.
00:14:31 Speaker 1
So I.
00:14:32 Speaker 1
Jumped aboard the night train came down.
00:14:35 Speaker 1
And about I came up in the elevator in the old Victorian building down here.
00:14:44 Speaker 1
Looking up in the elevator with Doctor Fregon.
00:14:48 Speaker 1
8:45 in the morning we used to get into the office a little earlier then.
00:14:52 Speaker 2
Be a little late.
00:14:54 Speaker 1
So, he said Bush, would you mind coming into my office?
00:15:00 Speaker 1
So I said no, very happy to do so, Sir.
00:15:04 Speaker 1
So I went in and he said I.
00:15:06 Speaker 1
Can see him yet he was.
00:15:08 Speaker 1
Very bashful, man.
00:15:09 Speaker 1
And he had.
00:15:11 Speaker 1
An engineer’s ring in his hand and the left or the right one, and then we used to sit and fiddle with this thing all the time.
00:15:19 Speaker 1
Bush, we are having a meeting this morning with the Board of Governors.
00:15:24 Speaker 1
And he said, I think I will be appointed as a.
00:15:29 Speaker 1
General manager.
00:15:30 Speaker 1
You see, there was an interim period there with Doctor Jamie Thompson.
00:15:34 Speaker 1
Took over the knee.
00:15:37 Speaker 1
After nine months, he had a belly full load and he quit.
00:15:40 Speaker 2
BC General, maybe you don’t have a usually.
00:15:42 Speaker 2
Along let you.
00:15:43 Speaker 1
Know, as a matter of fact, that’s what I think it was going.
00:15:47 Speaker 1
Back to the.
00:15:50 Speaker 1
Beginning of this book is the thoughts that inspired it.
00:15:54 Speaker 1
If I’d had the doing of it.
00:15:56 Speaker 1
I would have called heads will roll.
00:15:59 Speaker 2
That become of leaders with.
00:16:01 Speaker 2
Grading and we had some.
00:16:02 Speaker 1
Problems with that reason and they will.
00:16:07 Speaker 1
In any event, doctor Frigon said.
00:16:10 Speaker 1
I think I will be appointed general manager and Bush.
00:16:13 Speaker 1
I would like you to become the assistant general manager.
00:16:17 Speaker 1
Well, I couldn’t tell him what had.
00:16:22 Speaker 1
Happened the day before.
00:16:26 Speaker 1
So they went into the boardroom at 10:00 o’clock in the morning and the quarter after, about a quarter 20 minutes after 10 Doctor Frigate came out, met me in the hall and didn’t even speak to me.
00:16:41 Speaker 1
For a year after that.
00:16:44 Speaker 1
I found it very difficult actually to get along with Doctor Fregi didn’t trust me, and I don’t blame him.
00:16:51 Speaker 1
The idiot.
00:16:55 Speaker 1
Three of them.
00:16:57 Speaker 1
When the nomination, or if the.
00:17:00 Speaker 1
Proposal for the nomination of general manager came up.
00:17:04 Speaker 1
For nine members of the board at that time and.
00:17:10 Speaker 1
Ready, Moran.
00:17:12 Speaker 1
As a matter of fact.
00:17:14 Speaker 1
Was the vice chairman, I guess.
00:17:15 Speaker 1
And he proposed the Doctor Frigon being appointed.
00:17:18 Speaker 1
And one of these.
00:17:20 Speaker 1
He said well, we.
00:17:23 Speaker 1
I will not accept that we propose that Mister Young Bush will be a player, gentlemen.
00:17:30 Speaker 1
So I think that was on the Nice most comparison moment.
00:17:33 Speaker 2
We got did get the job.
00:17:35 Speaker 1
3863.
00:17:41 Speaker 1
I didn’t want the job and I think if I made a mistake in my career.
00:17:46 Speaker 1
Actually, going from the program side where I was really.
00:17:51 Speaker 1
I suppose if I have any qualifications at all, then.
00:17:55 Speaker 1
More of them on the on the program ended it than on the administrative end of the management and.
00:18:00 Speaker 2
There’s a good quarter of the book too, which?
00:18:04 Speaker 2
May or may not explained there.
00:18:05 Speaker 2
Anyways reflective programming policy, but at the time you talked to your daughter who needed orthodontic work and or indication and they first will make You Beautiful.
00:18:15 Speaker 2
And I’m going to look.
00:18:15 Speaker 1
At your education?
00:18:16 Speaker 1
That’s right.
00:18:19 Speaker 1
That’s right.
00:18:20 Speaker 1
Well, I I think I succeeded in the education part of it.
00:18:23 Speaker 1
They made.
00:18:25 Speaker 1
Beautiful, but she’s still a fine girl.
00:18:27 Speaker 1
Has a family of three and doing very well.
00:18:31 Speaker 2
That’s not a bad programming philosophy because you don’t have people listening and or watching them.
00:18:36 Speaker 2
And how do you educate them if they’re doing something wrong?
00:18:42 Speaker 1
That that pleasantly surprises me.
00:18:46 Speaker 1
Just what you said.
00:18:52 Speaker 1
It’s very difficult actually to get if I may use the term academic.
00:18:58 Speaker 1
We appreciate.
00:19:02 Speaker 1
The fact that.
00:19:05 Speaker 1
In radio and television, it is an entertainment medium.
00:19:11 Speaker 1
And you must entertain.
00:19:14 Speaker 1
There are there could be.
00:19:16 Speaker 1
I would like to say the percentage, but there are great many, not a great many, but there are some people who still will not accept what I consider.
00:19:27 Speaker 1
That as a basis in drug testing.
00:19:31 Speaker 2
That’s just the the audience is basically broadcast when if you don’t have a basic any place.
00:19:35 Speaker 1
But if you don’t have it, but I don’t say that you know that that you have to just amuse people.
00:19:45 Speaker 1
But basically broadcasting is show business.
00:19:49 Speaker 2
Well this.
00:19:50 Speaker 2
Is really the.
00:19:50 Speaker 1
And always will be.
00:19:51 Speaker 2
Origin of radio.
00:19:52 Speaker 2
It brought the theater into the.
00:19:55 Speaker 1
And and you have to use the the same.
00:20:01 Speaker 1
As the.
00:20:02 Speaker 1
One of the things that has been unfortunate in this country is that we we never had any vaudeville of our own.
00:20:12 Speaker 1
Because all the great stars in radio and television grew up.
00:20:17 Speaker 1
And believe you me, they knew that they had to hold the attention of the audience beyond the Footlights, and that they didn’t.
00:20:25 Speaker 1
They got rotten eggs which mattered or what have you.
00:20:28 Speaker 1
They got the hook and they.
00:20:29 Speaker 1
Got the hook.
00:20:31 Speaker 2
We’re just really that we do it.
00:20:33 Speaker 2
Did the book ever actually exist?
00:20:35 Speaker 2
This is one of these things that have come down with show business, you know, over the year.
00:20:39 Speaker 1
I don’t, I don’t think so.
00:20:41 Speaker 1
I think it’s a myth.
00:20:47 Speaker 1
Actually, I think the finest example of.
00:20:56 Speaker 1
And Sesame Street.
00:20:59 Speaker 1
I could sit fascinated and be fascinated by that show.
00:21:05 Speaker 1
Now you just analyze it and see what’s in it.
00:21:08 Speaker 1
Basically it’s entertainment and it holds the attention of youngsters in at the same time, it’s putting across a message.
00:21:17 Speaker 1
That, in my opinion, is education.
00:21:21 Speaker 1
But there are a lot of people who don’t recognize that some of these damn dull performance.
00:21:25 Speaker 1
As a matter of fact, there are people.
00:21:28 Speaker 1
There’s no question about it.
00:21:30 Speaker 1
There are people who.
00:21:33 Speaker 1
Don’t feel the way I feel about it.
00:21:36 Speaker 1
But as I say, I’ve been in what I call show business for 50 years.
00:21:40 Speaker 1
And I’m convinced that this is the way, not only.
00:21:45 Speaker 1
To get the attention of people, but to hold the attention of people.
00:21:52 Speaker 1
Again, I must say that as far as radio is concerned at the moment.
00:21:56 Speaker 1
I think the CBC is doing a reasonably good job.
00:22:00 Speaker 1
But I’m disappointed.
00:22:01 Speaker 1
Hate that either has such a low listening audience.
00:22:06 Speaker 1
The same thing is happening in television.
00:22:10 Speaker 1
But there will always be a place for the CBC, for those who like the type of programming that the CDC is involved in.
00:22:18 Speaker 1
And it does.
00:22:20 Speaker 2
Well it it cannot and probably should not agree with this.
00:22:26 Speaker 2
Be as much ice cream and can be as the private broadcaster because of its financial setup and its responsibility.
00:22:33 Speaker 1
I agree.
00:22:34 Speaker 2
But there’s no reason why we can’t have some of that as well.
00:22:38 Speaker 2
If she she made a mistake, isn’t it?
00:22:38 Speaker 1
No reason that.
00:22:41 Speaker 2
In doing too much ice cream and candy isn’t bringing too many of the American programs.
00:22:46 Speaker 2
Because this is what people enjoy watching.
00:22:49 Speaker 2
But they then catered to that.
00:22:50 Speaker 1
Well, I’ll tell you what.
00:22:51 Speaker 1
I would like to see.
00:22:54 Speaker 1
And that I have no, no, shall I say.
00:23:01 Speaker 1
Monetary reasons for suggesting this?
00:23:06 Speaker 1
And this applies right at the present time.
00:23:11 Speaker 1
I would like to see the CBC get out of commercial broadcasting altogether.
00:23:18 Speaker 1
They make about what?
00:23:20 Speaker 1
50 sixty $70 million a year.
00:23:24 Speaker 1
This isn’t the time for it either.
00:23:26 Speaker 1
What I’m going to suggest.
00:23:29 Speaker 1
But the CBC should be given another 200 to $150 million a year.
00:23:35 Speaker 1
For the sole purpose of putting on, I have many objections to them taking some American non commercial programs they can join up with the public broadcasting system and cooperate with them if they like, they can cooperate with the BBC if they like.
00:23:51 Speaker 1
But get out of that commercial broadcasting entirely.
00:23:55 Speaker 1
Be subsidized and provide a typical Canadian service.
00:24:02 Speaker 1
Four, I don’t care whether it’s 15%, twenty percent, 25%, but it will grow of that audience that wants that kind of broadcast, and particularly tell.
00:24:15 Speaker 1
I think they’re horsing around with radio.
00:24:17 Speaker 1
They don’t know what the hell they’re doing at the moment.
00:24:20 Speaker 1
And a very good friend of mine from here.
00:24:22 Speaker 1
As a matter of fact, who’s in charge of it now?
00:24:24 Speaker 1
The first time I see Dylan going to tell him it’s bitsy and Peacy and.
00:24:29 Speaker 1
It’s it’s just not interrelated.
00:24:32 Speaker 1
Some of the music that you hear on television today, sure it it it it it intrigued some of these kids.
00:24:40 Speaker 1
But So what?
00:24:41 Speaker 1
There I don’t think even the kids are are are, are are listening very much to the CBC.
00:24:48 Speaker 1
Maybe some of us who are older do I listen to CBC yet, but I get disgusted with some of this.
00:24:53 Speaker 1
Is radio disgusted with some of the things I hear.
00:24:58 Speaker 1
But I think that’s the answer to it now.
00:25:00 Speaker 1
As far as if they would do this.
00:25:05 Speaker 1
And this is.
00:25:06 Speaker 1
Actually I suppose.
00:25:09 Speaker 1
That there are not too many people who would.
00:25:11 Speaker 1
Agree with me.
00:25:13 Speaker 1
But there is a place for commercial broadcasting as well.
00:25:18 Speaker 1
There could be 2 full national networks.
00:25:22 Speaker 1
In Canada, I haven’t had any objection of global expand.
00:25:28 Speaker 1
They will absorb at least I between the two of them.
00:25:32 Speaker 1
They will observe at least 70, maybe 80% of the audience, but there you have that backlog of 20%, maybe 25% and gradually that will grow.
00:25:43 Speaker 1
Where it’s 30% or 40%.
00:25:46 Speaker 1
And we’d get rid of.
00:25:47 Speaker 1
All this bloody American nonsense with the matter.
00:25:52 Speaker 1
Well, you won’t get rid of it.
00:25:52 Speaker 2
There will be no alternative there.
00:25:53 Speaker 1
No, but you’ve got a reasonable alternative.
00:25:57 Speaker 2
We ran into problems. When was it the just completing commentary situation and thinking it was in 1956?
00:26:04 Speaker 2
You’ve come back.
00:26:09 Speaker 2
Yeah, within 1956 moved them back and we were you were. You were assistant general manager, handle manager at the.
00:26:16 Speaker 1
Right.
00:26:17 Speaker 1
Time, which no, I wouldn’t remember general manager.
00:26:23 Speaker 1
No, I don’t.
00:26:23 Speaker 2
Not not entitled when we’re getting busy job, we’re doing the job.
00:26:26 Speaker 1
Yeah, that’s right.
00:26:27 Speaker 1
On what I was that they changed my time.
00:26:32 Speaker 1
As a matter of fact, when they made Don Manson assistant general manager in order to they thought they had to take care of my wounded feelings.
00:26:42 Speaker 1
I don’t want the damn job in the 1st place, but none of it.
00:26:45 Speaker 1
They made me director general program.
00:26:51 Speaker 1
So that preview country thing.
00:26:57 Speaker 1
I dare say.
00:26:59 Speaker 1
If I had it to do over again, I wouldn’t be so impetuous.
00:27:03 Speaker 1
If you like.
00:27:05 Speaker 1
Looking back on it now, Parliament only had two more weeks to.
00:27:15 Speaker 1
And I’m sorry I can’t find this.
00:27:18 Speaker 1
But to see how limited to men as President I was vice president.
00:27:23 Speaker 1
Al took sick on the 9th of January.
00:27:27 Speaker 1
I was left there alone.
00:27:30 Speaker 1
I had a new Board of Governors.
00:27:32 Speaker 1
None of them knew a damn thing about broadcasting, except Kate Hayton, who thought she knew everything about broadcast.
00:27:47 Speaker 1
Complaints were coming in from all political parties with this so-called preview commentary. Why the name I haven’t? Whoever gave it that title?
00:27:55 Speaker 1
I don’t know what the how can you have a preview calendar?
00:27:59 Speaker 1
Your preview of what which turned out to be a review of the day’s happenings in Parliament.
00:28:06 Speaker 1
It had to be.
00:28:06 Speaker 2
Very personalized viewpoint of you before you.
00:28:08 Speaker 1
Well, so.
00:28:11 Speaker 1
What happened?
00:28:15 Speaker 1
This wasn’t the right.
00:28:16 Speaker 1
Government interference.
00:28:17 Speaker 1
And then there never wasn’t fighting for other people.
00:28:26 Speaker 1
The CCS.
00:28:30 Speaker 1
Liberals, we’re all raising Cain now.
00:28:34 Speaker 1
Don’t forget, too, that this was.
00:28:37 Speaker 1
This new board was appointed by John Diefenbaker.
00:28:41 Speaker 1
And they were all Tories.
00:28:44 Speaker 1
No question about that.
00:28:46 Speaker 1
Every damn one.
00:28:47 Speaker 2
Of the previous boring or previous CG boards and pretty well liberal.
00:28:52 Speaker 1
But I wanna I wanna make one point here with the exception of 1.
00:28:57 Speaker 1
Of 1 member of those of the various boards of governors that we have.
00:29:04 Speaker 1
There’s only one man.
00:29:07 Speaker 1
Who didn’t?
00:29:09 Speaker 1
Actually, he took a notice.
00:29:15 Speaker 1
What would they call it?
00:29:18 Speaker 1
An Oval Office.
00:29:21 Speaker 1
And irrespective of his political background, I have never known but one man in the in the in the various boards under which I I I operated.
00:29:31 Speaker 1
That reached that old.
00:29:35 Speaker 1
And I won’t name him.
00:29:36 Speaker 1
But he used to run from a board meeting and call his minister and tell him what it has.
00:29:42 Speaker 1
I’ve seen others as a matter of fact.
00:29:45 Speaker 1
The chat from Edmonton I remember there was a very consensus question came up.
00:29:51 Speaker 1
And he said in spite of the fact that I am a liberal.
00:29:57 Speaker 1
He said I am going to vote for this resolution and I will tell the man who appointed me to go to hell.
00:30:06 Speaker 1
Anyway, we had this new board.
00:30:10 Speaker 1
Out at 6.
00:30:12 Speaker 1
And we were getting these complaints coming in.
00:30:15 Speaker 1
The chairman of the board was there.
00:30:17 Speaker 1
That particular time he was getting, we had the meeting of the board and this was one of the.
00:30:24 Speaker 1
Items on the agenda.
00:30:30 Speaker 1
Come early June.
00:30:34 Speaker 1
You should read it in the newspapers people were.
00:30:40 Speaker 1
Very severely.
00:30:42 Speaker 1
Various commentaries that were being put on now again.
00:30:47 Speaker 1
Being bitter and fatal, right?
00:30:50 Speaker 1
The chap who was the program producer here in autumn, had been given.
00:30:58 Speaker 1
Leave, I think.
00:30:59 Speaker 1
Or at least leave that to go to England for a period of time.
00:31:02 Speaker 1
And they had a junior in here.
00:31:07 Speaker 1
And these so-called scribes from the press gallery knew this.
00:31:12 Speaker 1
The other guy was, I don’t blame Frank Pearce entirely for this.
00:31:17 Speaker 1
He didn’t have the staff, but the chapter was here, wasn’t afraid to tell these the chap just how far they could go.
00:31:25 Speaker 1
The other lad for the youngster, maybe 2324 or something like that, and he left. He was letting him get away with murder.
00:31:35 Speaker 1
What happened was.
00:31:37 Speaker 1
This came up during the.
00:31:41 Speaker 1
Times that.
00:31:43 Speaker 1
Parliament wanted to create.
00:31:45 Speaker 1
A out of town residence or a cottage if you like.
00:31:49 Speaker 1
For Mr.
00:31:50 Speaker 1
decently now decent Baker opposed it.
00:31:52 Speaker 1
He did not want it.
00:31:54 Speaker 1
And said so.
00:31:57 Speaker 1
However, they were determined to put the things too.
00:32:01 Speaker 1
And the well known broadcasters.
00:32:03 Speaker 1
And he’s building broadcasting.
00:32:08 Speaker 1
And what’s that?
00:32:09 Speaker 1
Who he was, who he is.
00:32:13 Speaker 1
But on one particular night, this was the real finale.
00:32:18 Speaker 1
One night.
00:32:19 Speaker 1
He had listened to this debate in the House.
00:32:22 Speaker 1
The House rose at 10:00 o’clock he went and wrote a script.
00:32:26 Speaker 1
And in doing so, must have consumed about half upon the Scotch whisky.
00:32:32 Speaker 1
Took his copy when roaring down the halls of parliament in the center block.
00:32:37 Speaker 1
Yelling at the top of this.
00:32:38 Speaker 1
This is God’s tooth.
00:32:39 Speaker 1
It’s the top of his place.
00:32:41 Speaker 1
I’m going to get this *** ** * *****.
00:32:43 Speaker 1
It’s the last *** **** thing I ever do.
00:32:46 Speaker 1
And here was.
00:32:47 Speaker 1
His copy in his hand.
00:32:49 Speaker 1
I was out of the car.
00:32:53 Speaker 1
I didn’t hear the broadcast.
00:32:56 Speaker 1
And I noticed that very well.
00:33:01 Speaker 1
I have not that much confidence in it.
00:33:04 Speaker 1
But anyway.
00:33:07 Speaker 1
I got a call from George Nolan, secretary.
00:33:12 Speaker 1
And she said Mr.
00:33:13 Speaker 1
Bushnell, did you hear preview commentary last night?
00:33:16 Speaker 1
They said no, I didn’t.
00:33:18 Speaker 1
And she said well.
00:33:22 Speaker 1
There was a real castigation of Mr.
00:33:26 Speaker 1
And she said, I wish have have you got it recorded?
00:33:29 Speaker 1
I said yes, it will be recorded.
00:33:31 Speaker 1
I heard it.
00:33:34 Speaker 1
There had been three in a row like that.
00:33:38 Speaker 1
They weren’t all the same.
00:33:39 Speaker 1
They weren’t all after Mr.
00:33:40 Speaker 1
Deeds and Baker, but they were highly critical in using as a matter of fact terms that I felt were unjust.
00:33:50 Speaker 1
Or extreme.
00:33:53 Speaker 1
So I listened to this and then.
00:33:55 Speaker 1
I looked to.
00:33:57 Speaker 1
Look, tell me the day was very annoyed.
00:34:01 Speaker 1
So I collected the three new commentary scripts for the last week and I sent them up to Dan McCarthy.
00:34:08 Speaker 1
And I said, Dan, please give me your opinion of an evaluation of these.
00:34:15 Speaker 1
I didn’t send them to Frank Pierce.
00:34:17 Speaker 1
I said to Dad and I weren’t confident.
00:34:19 Speaker 1
As a matter of fact, Dan knows anyone in the ABC.
00:34:23 Speaker 1
I can’t find that letter.
00:34:26 Speaker 1
I don’t know whatever happened there, but Dan came back and he condemned these script.
00:34:32 Speaker 1
As being.
00:34:34 Speaker 1
One sided.
00:34:39 Speaker 1
I think he used the term.
00:34:41 Speaker 1
Should not have been broadcast by the CDC.
00:34:44 Speaker 1
And that at the moment I decided look far as this damn thing is concerned.
00:34:50 Speaker 2
Two or three.
00:34:51 Speaker 1
Minutes two or three minutes.
00:34:54 Speaker 1
And I called in Charles Jennings and said look, as of next Monday, we go to the Canadian Press and get a through report and what’s happening in Parliament.
00:35:01 Speaker 1
No more of this nonsense.
00:35:02 Speaker 1
I also learned and this annoyed me.
00:35:07 Speaker 1
That these guys, as a matter of fact, were being chosen for the most part.
00:35:12 Speaker 1
Where not only being paid for the broadcast.
00:35:17 Speaker 1
But we’re writing.
00:35:19 Speaker 1
For various.
00:35:21 Speaker 1
Ministers in the cabinet.
00:35:24 Speaker 1
And various people in the opposition.
00:35:28 Speaker 1
And I said that’s enough of that.
00:35:29 Speaker 1
There’s bias.
00:35:32 Speaker 1
So I turned to Canadian Press preview commentary.
00:35:35 Speaker 1
The name disappeared, but the reports did not.
00:35:40 Speaker 1
I have a great deal.
00:35:41 Speaker 1
Of respect for Frank, in many ways.
00:35:48 Speaker 1
He he came down to see me and his immediate boss was Charles Jennings, and I remember I can see it as vividly as I can see that picture.
00:35:59 Speaker 1
Frank, stopping me.
00:36:02 Speaker 1
Right outside the center block, saying Mr.
00:36:05 Speaker 1
Bush and I’d like to talk to you tonight.
00:36:07 Speaker 1
Let’s say I was.
00:36:10 Speaker 1
He disturbed at that time when they said, look Frank, for God’s sake, go and talk to Charles Jennings. He’s your boss.
00:36:16 Speaker 1
And they passed it by and that race train.
00:36:20 Speaker 1
And that’s what brought about the Great parliamentary committee.
00:36:25 Speaker 1
Looking back, as I say, I might have used better judgement, not created that great.
00:36:30 Speaker 1
Fewer are, but so many things had gone wrong.
00:36:33 Speaker 1
That particular spring, this damn thing down in Montreal where we had, we had a 69 day strike down there.
00:36:40 Speaker 1
Then we had a program in which I had to write to the bishops.
00:36:43 Speaker 1
As a matter of fact, to apologize.
00:36:47 Speaker 2
Or that that was the sink.
00:36:50 Speaker 1
Vilification, if you like of this great.
00:36:54 Speaker 1
Faith and.
00:36:57 Speaker 1
I suppose maybe I think.
00:37:00 Speaker 1
And then the Irish, and so impetuous.
00:37:02 Speaker 1
I wouldn’t have done it.
00:37:03 Speaker 1
But I said I’ve had enough.
00:37:04 Speaker 1
That’s that.
00:37:07 Speaker 2
Or the committee eventually reinstated the program.
00:37:10 Speaker 1
Well, the not the committee, the board.
00:37:14 Speaker 1
And that was a kangaroo court over the washroom.
00:37:21 Speaker 2
How long did the program having been reinstated?
00:37:24 Speaker 2
How long did?
00:37:24 Speaker 2
It in fact, why?
00:37:29 Speaker 1
I I really don’t remember.
00:37:32 Speaker 1
Do you miss that?
00:37:33 Speaker 1
Not very long.
00:37:35 Speaker 1
They don’t.
00:37:38 Speaker 1
No, I’d use my head.
00:37:40 Speaker 1
Maybe I would just let it right on and put up with the cleaning and.
00:37:46 Speaker 1
As them in charge of programming and I would have dropped it or made other arrangements in the fall.
00:37:56 Speaker 1
Being somewhat infectious and both headed, I guess, right?
00:37:59 Speaker 2
Well, peers and.
00:38:01 Speaker 2
To some extent, Jim Allard yesterday.
00:38:05 Speaker 2
Maintaining equipment precipitously appears, of course, in this book.
00:38:10 Speaker 2
That’s not so much in programming along there was that implication as well, but certainly in the issuance of licenses, there was a good deal of political patronage.
00:38:19 Speaker 2
You went to some great lengths when talking.
00:38:21 Speaker 2
When you’re talking mysterious work to say that no, this is nice in the programming area is categorically not true.
00:38:28 Speaker 2
You know, you get two different versions there.
00:38:30 Speaker 2
When there was political path in Egypt, political reference and we.
00:38:33 Speaker 1
Say that was as far as Frank is concerned, he has no reason to know.
00:38:39 Speaker 1
How the hell would he know?
00:38:41 Speaker 1
No matter of fact, sitting up there in Toronto with this, I’ll tell you what this this is.
00:38:46 Speaker 1
I think it’s.
00:38:49 Speaker 1
But when guys Stone Murray came over, there was a committee set up.
00:38:52 Speaker 1
The Liberal would come into power.
00:38:54 Speaker 1
And the committee set up to to.
00:39:01 Speaker 1
Oh, he was the head of it and we didn’t name Derek.
00:39:06 Speaker 1
Who wanted to?
00:39:08 Speaker 1
Get some of our people in Toronto and wanted to get them fired.
00:39:12 Speaker 1
And Mr.
00:39:12 Speaker 1
Murray said, you know, these people from Toronto, Bush, you’ve brought meet with this group.
00:39:18 Speaker 1
And we’ll fix it.
00:39:23 Speaker 1
Sure, this is what they wanted.
00:39:25 Speaker 1
The head of our publicity and public relations site.
00:39:29 Speaker 1
Was a lady.
00:39:31 Speaker 1
And her husband?
00:39:32 Speaker 1
I think this is the book too.
00:39:36 Speaker 1
But he had been.
00:39:41 Speaker 1
Or the.
00:39:46 Speaker 1
During that campaign.
00:39:48 Speaker 1
Right here.
00:39:51 Speaker 1
And they said, look.
00:39:53 Speaker 1
They didn’t know.
00:39:54 Speaker 1
As a matter of fact, and she had left him.
00:39:56 Speaker 1
He was a drunkard.
00:39:58 Speaker 1
That she had.
00:40:00 Speaker 1
And they said this woman’s got to go. Her husband worked for the Tories.
00:40:07 Speaker 1
So I told them the circumstances they said.
00:40:09 Speaker 1
Yeah, that’s fine.
00:40:10 Speaker 1
I guess he did.
00:40:12 Speaker 1
When I said, on the other hand, may I remind you, the last campaign he worked for the Liberals.
00:40:18 Speaker 1
Oh, they didn’t know that I said it’s a fact he did.
00:40:24 Speaker 1
Then they said.
00:40:26 Speaker 1
We want a job for Mr.
00:40:27 Speaker 1
Whisher Campbell.
00:40:30 Speaker 1
Work for the Premier of Ontario.
00:40:35 Speaker 1
And his campaign, I said, did he get paid for it?
00:40:37 Speaker 1
Oh, yeah.
00:40:39 Speaker 1
And then.
00:40:41 Speaker 1
I said well.
00:40:43 Speaker 1
Wish it’s a fine person.
00:40:44 Speaker 1
I know him.
00:40:45 Speaker 1
He’s a personal friend of mine.
00:40:47 Speaker 1
And I said I’d be glad to have him joined the organization because the good musician, he’s a good chap.
00:40:54 Speaker 1
And but I said I don’t have a position on for now.
00:40:59 Speaker 1
By the way, I said how much?
00:41:01 Speaker 1
Wishard would have to give up.
00:41:03 Speaker 1
Some of those other.
00:41:07 Speaker 1
And and certainly he wouldn’t be allowed to go out and sing.
00:41:10 Speaker 1
For any candidate in the future.
00:41:14 Speaker 1
And they said, well, you would have to pay him a salary of 10,000 a year. And I said, well, it’s my job you’re looking for because I only get 9000 at the moment, 8000 that pass though.
00:41:28 Speaker 1
Then they had another chat.
00:41:30 Speaker 1
It was a Jamaican.
00:41:32 Speaker 1
That I had used in CCNC a tenor singer.
00:41:36 Speaker 1
And one of the members of the committee who?
00:41:40 Speaker 1
Clinton was appointed to the Senate.
00:41:42 Speaker 1
Said well.
00:41:44 Speaker 1
Branson hall.
00:41:46 Speaker 1
Was kind enough to promote and.
00:41:50 Speaker 1
Same for me during my campaign.
00:41:54 Speaker 1
And I said to Japan said yes, I said how much? He said $25. I said how much he saying? He said two songs, one at the beginning and one at the end.
00:42:03 Speaker 1
Well, I said I’ve had him on the air in Toronto singing full 15 minute recital program for 15 bucks.
00:42:11 Speaker 1
But I said if you want to find out anything about him, go to the children’s court or whatever it is, the family court and find out what’s happened with his private life.
00:42:21 Speaker 1
So I said I won’t appoint him, I said.
00:42:25 Speaker 1
I’ll tell you what we are doing and what we need.
00:42:27 Speaker 1
We need some good secretaries in the CC.
00:42:29 Speaker 1
If anyone of you people.
00:42:31 Speaker 1
Will tell me where I can find some very good types people to see.
00:42:39 Speaker 1
Any good sectors?
00:42:41 Speaker 1
If there is well qualified as some other applications we get, I promise you that they’ll give them serious consideration, serious and sympathetic consideration.
00:42:53 Speaker 1
There was only one chapter sent 2 girls to me from his writing.
00:42:57 Speaker 1
They were excellent.
00:42:58 Speaker 1
We appointed them as far as I know, that’s the only political patronage that ever took place that I’m aware of, and Frank Pierce can go to hell.
00:43:08 Speaker 1
He better prove it.
00:43:09 Speaker 1
And you can tell him, I said.
00:43:13 Speaker 1
Frank has written the best book of anybody as a matter of fact, on on the early days of broadcast.
00:43:19 Speaker 2
Comprehensive, but there is this conspiratorial view he has.
00:43:20 Speaker 1
Oh my God.
00:43:23 Speaker 1
Frank Azalie said.
00:43:26 Speaker 1
Obviously, that’s part of Frank’s speech.
00:43:28 Speaker 2
I don’t know whether I often wonder whether I’m naive because I keep thinking that people are doing what they say they’re doing because the reasons they say they’re doing it and.
00:43:36 Speaker 1
Yeah, no.