That newscast was truly an innovative idea created by program director Bob Giles. The concept was to compartmentalize a radio newscast in the same format as Time magazine with segments for international, national and local news and politics, science, entertainment, sports and weather. It was a half-hour package and was extraordinarily well done.
My first newscast on CHAB was a ten-minute major newscast at 10:00 p.m. I read it over carefully, rehearsed it and went on the air, nervous as a cat. Although I had had a year’s experience at CJNB North Battleford, this was different. CHAB had a number of very experienced announcers whom I had admired and respected for years. Now I would be working alongside them. I was intimidated but it turned out I need not have worried. The first phone call after that 10 p.m. newscast came from a guy whose voice I recognized instantly. It was one of our outstanding announcers with a great voice—Joe Lawlor. He introduced himself and said, “That was a fine newscast, George. Good job!” I was so pleased I could have burst with pride.
My interest in news was just beginning. As a kid wanting to get into radio, I had wanted to be a disc jockey. I was now realizing there was more substance to news. Giles eventually moved me into doing the major half-hour news package at 6:00 p.m., the one based on the Time magazine format, and I did quite well with it.
Then Bob Giles left CHAB and moved to CKNW, then located in New Westminster, BC. He invited me to come visit him on my summer holiday, and I drove to the West Coast with my brother, Bob, his wife, Myrt, and their young son, Robbie. When I visited Giles at CKNW one of the first things he said was, “So when do you want to come to CKNW?” I was floored. I was far too inexperienced to come to such a big station but Giles told me to apply to program director Hal Davis. I was barely twenty years old and CKNW was not in the habit of hiring people that young. But to my amazement, I was offered a job at $300 a month. I’ll never know why I had the audacity to say I needed $350, but Davis said, “Sorry, $300—absolute tops!” I accepted. It was sometime later that I learned that Davis had hired me largely on Bob Giles’s recommendation. I have always been deeply indebted to both of them. Both have passed away. Each made a great contribution to radio and to my career.
Although I had been a disc jockey and general announcer in the first four years of my career, I gradually began taking an interest in news coverage, particularly when I was assigned to the 6:00 p.m. news program at CHAB Moose Jaw in 1953 with the Time magazine format. When I moved to CKNW Vancouver in 1956, I became a full-time newsman for the first time in my career. It was the beginning of a fantastic journey.
Chapter 6
Family Life
When Joan was Nineteen and I was twenty-one, we began our married life in a rented house in New Westminster, BC. It was owned by a couple initially from Saskatchewan, Mr. and Mrs. Larroe. They were delightful people and very kind to us. We looked after their house while they went away on a trip. When they returned, we moved to another rented house just down the street, also owned by a couple from Saskatchewan. We were living there when our first child was born, a beautiful little girl whom we named Linda Joan. The name Linda came from a song that I liked by a singer named Buddy Clarke. The song “Linda” included the lyric “When I go to sleep, I never count sheep, I count all the beautiful charms about Linda.” I always swore Linda had red hair but Joan and her parents disagreed, saying her hair was more blond than red. Linda was born on August 12, 1957. Joan had just turned twenty, and she was a wonderful young mother. She had help at first from her parents visiting from North Battleford and lots of help from my aunt Elinor Butler.
Eighteen months later, we were still living in the same house when our second child was born, another beautiful baby girl we named Lorraine Marie for a good friend of Joan’s, Lorraine Marie Adele Therese Thibadeau. We shortened Lorraine to Lorrie. She was born on Valentine’s Day, February 14, 1959. Both girls did very well in school. I wanted to make sure they went to university, quietly driving them several times through the vast campus of the University of British Columbia. I guess they got the idea, because both graduated from UBC, Linda with a degree in social work and Lorrie in education. Linda moved on to radio (at my station, CKNW) as a talk-show producer and later into book publishing media relations, escorting well-known authors like Pierre Berton to various media outlets. Berton was so tall he could not ride comfortably in Linda’s small car; she had to borrow a larger vehicle for him.
I am so proud of Linda for so many reasons. In her early forties she was diagnosed with cancer, which was detected in her arm. At first, it was thought that treatment had eradicated the cancer, but it subsequently spread to her lymph nodes. She was in imminent danger, and she agreed to treatment with a drug called Interferon. The treatments were at Lions Gate Hospital in North Vancouver, quite some distance from her home in the White Rock area. The treatments were very hard on her, but she had always been one tough little gal, just over five feet tall and very, very determined. She survived the year-long treatments. She once told me, “Dad, it’s like walking on the floor of the ocean wearing cement boots.” Her cancer went into remission and she resumed her normal life, even going beyond that. Always a good runner in track meets in school, she took up long-distance running, taking part in at least eight marathons, including two in Boston. She went there a second time to honour those who had been killed and injured in the 2013 bombings. She also ran marathons in New York, Chicago, Portland, Victoria and Vancouver. She is one tough woman.
Her sister, Lorrie, went on to become a fabulous teacher in a career spanning more than thirty-seven years and still going. For virtually her entire career, she has taught Grade 1 children—she loves the challenges. Lorrie is married to Dave Watt, a super guy. Linda also married a very fine fellow named Bill Field. Our third child, Kenneth George, was born on May 31, 1961. The little rented house on Eighth Avenue in New Westminster was getting crowded. We bought our first house in Surrey. But we did not have enough money for the down payment of $1,500 and had no collateral, so I went to my station manager, Bill Hughes, for help. He signed a note guaranteeing our loan. I have never forgotten his kindness and support.
Ken was a beloved child. He did well in school and went on to BCIT to follow me in broadcasting. He excelled in radio. His first and only station was CHNL Fort St. John, BC. He started as a staff announcer and moved into sales. He did so well that owner Gene Daniel made him manager of CHNL and a satellite station in Fort Nelson, farther north. There were plans to move him to a larger station that Gene owned in Alberta. Ken was successful not only in his radio job at age twenty-four, but he was also active in the community as a member of Kinsmen Club, and he had a soft spot for the Child Centre in Fort St. John, which cared for disadvantaged children. Ken was in love with Shelley Hawrelak, with whom he lived in his own house in Fort St. John. It was a great life.
On Sunday morning, May 3, 1987, Ken and Shelley rented a canoe with the intention of celebrating their engagement by paddling on Charlie Lake, just out of town. Apparently unknown to Ken, Charlie Lake is susceptible to brisk winds in early May. The wind came up suddenly, overturning their canoe, and they were both thrown into the icy water. Although they were wearing life jackets, Ken must have known they could not last long in such cold water. For some time he was able to keep pushing Shelley up onto the overturned canoe, saving her life. He did so at great risk to himself, and because he spent so much time in the cold water, he died of hypothermia before rescuers could save him. I received a heartbreaking phone call from a doctor who had done all he could to save Ken at the Fort St. John Hospital, but Ken had died. It was and remains the saddest day of my life, as it was for Joan and our daughters. I think of Ken every day, often visiting his grave, and I treasure the memories of a fine young man and a marvellous son. God bless him. Our family is proud of a scholarship in Ken’s name at the BC Institute of Technology from where he graduated to begin his broadcast career. There is also a playground named for him in Fort St. John, the Kinsmen Ken Garrett Memorial Park. Clearly Ken made a positive impression in the community.
After a period of heavy grieving, the loss of Ken was something we just had to accept and move on from. We’ve had