ONCE UPON A TIME… The staff gathered that Friday afternoon in what was called the President’s Office, a typically spacious, senior-management-type room dominated by a large fireplace. Grouped by department, people anxiously clustered around various landmarks: the bowl of Bits & Bites, the leather couch, the table featuring both a “fine selection of non-imported beer,”… Continue reading Faulty Tower
Series: Summer 2001
Gotcha
On June 15, 2000, Citytv cameraman Don Neheli sets out to report on what looks to be a routine protest organized by the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty. Neheli arrives equipped with a two-way Motorola radio and video camera, and sees about 500 people marching in mob formation. Grandparents mingle with rave kids and councillors hang… Continue reading Gotcha
State of the Union
The day national columnist Catherine Ford returned to work after the Calgary Herald strike ended last summer, it was as though she’d stepped into a completely different office. Ford, who has worked at the Herald since 1981, hadn’t seen the inside of the brick building on Calgary’s 16th Street S.E. since November 8, 1999. A… Continue reading State of the Union
A Serious Makeover
A spring day in 1989 and the leggy, blonde, 21-year-old Leanne Delap, fresh out of journalism school, dressed in an all-black ensemble, is climbing up the stairs in a converted industrial space to begin her six-month internship at Toronto Life. It was an exciting time at the magazine, a publication that some accused of being… Continue reading A Serious Makeover
A Question of Truth
In a darkened corner of the Scotia Lunch in Shelburne, Nova Scotia, Wayne Butler leans across the table toward his friend, Floyd Hemeon. His naturally red face flushes even more as he moves in closer, stressing a point to Floyd, who sits back in the blue, plastic chair, takes off his baseball cap and scratches… Continue reading A Question of Truth