In the early 1970s I was hired as a radio and television news reporter for CFCN in Calgary.
I went to the station to sign my employment papers. It was the weekend and the rather cavernous newsroom was empty except for one man standing and reading something on a bulletin board. I walked up to him, he turned, smiled and reached out his hand and said, “Hi, Pete Lougheed.” The soon-to-be premier was there on a Sunday, taping a show.
Lougheed figures in another one of my Alberta experiences. In the first months on the job, I was assigned to co-host the provincial election coverage for radio.
Lougheed had taken over leadership of the Progressive Conservatives a few years earlier when they didn’t have a seat in the legislature. At the time, Alberta was a Social Credit powerhouse and had been for decades. But it was time for a change and Lougheed was a good campaigner and his message was change.
Gord, the program director, and I sat down in a small radio studio and started reading returns at 7 p.m. when the polls closed. We figured an hour and a half would be the duration of our coverage and we would be off the air by 8:30. But right away we saw something unique was happening. Within 15 minutes of the polls closing, Lougheed and the Conservatives had a commanding lead in every seat in the province. In fact, he got so far ahead we started confirming one seat after another for the Conservatives. Wow! It was over in 40 minutes. The dawn of a new political era in Alberta and I felt privileged to witness it.
I was on the road a lot in Alberta, from covering military exercises taking place down by the Montana border, then covering protests, because of the military exercises. I was up to Cold Lake plus Medicine Hat and Lethbridge and, of course, covering conventions in the Rockies too.
But nothing in my Alberta time stands as tall as Ralph Klein. When I was there, Ralph was the city hall reporter. Unlike the rest of us who reported to the newsroom for assignments, Ralph had his own office downtown. Some days there were more reporters than assignments and I had to go find my own story. I would drift down to Ralph’s office and hang out there.
On a slow day, Ralph and I would go for a beer and we became good friends. It was an experience to walk the streets of downtown Calgary with Ralph. He knew everybody. This was his neighbourhood. These people were his contacts. Looking back on his career as mayor and then premier, I could understand that he had a solid base, not of the politically sophisticated, but the people on the street.
Ralph became famous for the comment, “Let the eastern bastards freeze in the dark.”
He didn’t say it but got the blame for saying it.
I loved Calgary, had a good boss, liked the company but when I received a job offer in television management in Winnipeg, I couldn’t turn it down. I stayed there for the next six years.
I have fond memories of my short time in Alberta. Even back then western alienation was just below the surface. It’s always been there, fostered by the belief that all problems in Alberta are caused by federal politics. That wasn’t true then, it isn’t true now, but the prime minister is an easy target now and he will continue to be.
After all, this is Canada.
Bruce Graham is a retired broadcast journalist, author and playwright who lives in Amherst. He is a member of the Amherst News Community Editorial Panel.
