Biography
I started working in newspapers at the Ottawa Journal in 1977 as a copy boy. That’s right that’s what the job was called 41 years ago. The job entailed taking a paper tape from a ticker, rolling it up and using a pneumatic tube system sending the tapes to what was known as the composing room where it would be translated into type and eventually put on a press. I then went to Carleton for the one year program and did not graduate. I got a job instead at the Medicine Hat News where I did everything from cops to courts to city hall to city editor in two years on the bald prairie. Moved back to Ottawa and back to the Journal for a few weeks. Then it folded. I hurried down Highway 401 and landed a job at The Star in Windsor. Two more years and I was back in Ottawa. I would eventually find a spot at the Ottawa Citizen where I would work until 2016. These days I write and edit an arts journalism project called ARTSFILE; I work at iPolitics and now I’m working with you, back where I started so many years ago. My grandmother once said to me “It’s a long road, if you don’t weaken.” She was right.
