Keeping it Real…

One of my private stories … until now … is how/why I made the transition from newspapering to television.

I had always wanted to be a newspaperman: the first article I ever had published was in 1956: a children’s book review in the Montreal Gazette: I was 11.   I still have it.

From there, after volunteers were sought out in class, I  became Canadian “correspondent” for a kids’ page in the Adelaide (Australia) Sunday Times ..and wrote several articles on life in Canada … not for cash, but for rewards in the form of books etc. on Australia.

Then came Letters to the Editor in Montreal newspapers (a funny story on this to follow some day ; reporter for The Georgian (Sir George Williams University newspaper; and after graduation, assistant Editor of Contact journal, house organ of Canadian Industries Limited;  in 1969 on to daily newspapers .. Saskatoon Star Phoenix, Regina Leader-Post and, in 1971, I joined The Vancouver Sun.

It was a great paper and a great newsroom under the help of Managing Editor Bill Galt and City Desk Editor Scott Schill.

I began by covering Burnaby City Council, then moved on to Vancouver City Hall, where I covered Mayors Tom Campbell, Art Phillips (Gordon Campbell was his executive assistant!) Mike Harcourt etc. until I was named The Sun’s FIRSTever Regional Affairs Reporter, coveirng the Greater Vancouver Regional District full time.

Always a print guy! And in 1974 I was appointed to the The Sun’s prestigious Legislative Bureau in Victoria, where I stayed and wrote until 1979.

What changed?  The Sun and Province were shut down by an 8 month strike that began in October, 1978 .. largely over technological change.

Many Sun/Province reporters went to work temporarily for BCTV and other TV stations filling the gap with the loss of the city’s two major dailies. 

I stayed still … in Victoria, and learned to live again on Kraft dinner (just like my early days in Saskatoon!).

And when the papers’ unions set up their own twice-weekly newspaper The Express (complete with ads) I pitched in to help out: not only covering the Legislature for the paper; but also picking up bundles of the paper at the bus depot twice a week, placing them in stores (that would take them), and hotel lobbies … collecting the funds from sales and sending it all back to the union.

The Express helped raise our weekly strike pay to $200/week ..tax free!  And enough to force the company into serious negotiations that ultimately ended the dispute in June 1979.

I was ready, willing and happy to get back to work, writing for The Sun.  But it didn’t take long to realize newspaper management weren’t happy with my writing for The Express and also distributing it in Victoria (couldn’t they take a joke!). I sensed a re-assignment to general news in Vancouver was coming.

But then a funny thing happened on the way to their purgatory: the Legislative job for BCTV (two desks over from mine in the Press Gallery) became open.

And good friend and Sun columnist Marjorie Nichols suggested I “go for it”.  But me doing TV?   A portly, Columbo-like character entering the world of bimbos and bozos (those oh, so cute TV women and men, who go into television more to promote themselves than to really help people and get to the bottom of real stories)?

But BCTV was different .. under the leadership of News Director Cameron Bell and Assignment Editor Keith Bradbury they had begun to weave a whole new TV News tapestry … assembled with the homeliest looking group of reporters .. YET  all first class journalists, diggers and story tellers  … mostly from print. 

And apparently, they liked both my newspaper writings and also my regular appearances as an interviwer on their own meet-the-press T.V. show, “Capital Comment”.

A perfect fit for me?  I still had lots of terpidation … so , at Marjorie’s suggestion, checked with BCTV icon Jack Webster about my making the jump.

“Harvey, you’ll do fine. Just go out and buy yourself a new sooooot … and call them up!,” Jack advised, in his trademark Scottish brogue.

So I did .. and was invited to audition. The best move I ever made!

It took a while to learn the new technology and televison story-telling techniques, especially up to the standard of BCTV,  but working with some of the best people in the news business, it worked.

I still find it hard to understand, after 26 years at BCTV (now GlobalBC), including 8 years on what was supposed to be a two-year posting to Parliament Hill, and all the awards I won (both B.C. and national) how popular my work actually became (still almost embarrassed to say it!).

I was just being myself …a print journalist at heart … being extemely curious, not afraid to ask tough questions of people in power,  and always putting the story before myself (did very few on-camera standups if pictures were better).

Maybe those are the keys to both print journalism and television news .. but unfortunately so often lost now in the once-again largely ego-driven world of TV bozos and bimbos. 

(With apologies to the few really good reporters and story tellers who remain, and I’m sure they … and we  … know who they are,   from their work!)

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