Identical Twins #6: My Name is Peter
Five years ago today, Peter Gzowski died. Gzowski was, and probably still is, the most-loved radio broadcaster in Canadian history.
Most of my childhood memories have Gzowski’s dulcet tones in the background. I’m pretty sure our kitchen radio couldn’t pick up anything other than Morningside, and their bookshelf contained seemingly endless copies of the Morningside Letters books.
Later, he became a bit of a role model for me, the “dream job” I held in the back of my mind as I worked through journalism school. And then, lo and behold, I landed a job at CBC Radio.
I must confess that I only sighted Peter Gzowski a few times during the years where his tenure at the Toronto Broadcasting Centre overlapped with mine. I’d see him shuffling through the atrium wearing a stained sweater and looking forlorn about the world’s conspiracy against smoking.
Peter Gzowski signed off from Morningside in 1997, the year I landed my first full contract at CBC. And in a switch that only increased my fondness for him, Gzowski then went to my alma mater, Trent University, to become its eight chancellor. (It has since built a massive new college in his honour.)
Peter Gzowski died in 2002 of pulmonary disease due to emphysema.
The CBC Archives site has a nice collection of Peter Gzowski clips, and today Tod Maffin posted a nice tribute called Peter Gzowski Remembered.
And now, I’m going to go and ruin it all by posting a frivolous addition to my Identical Twins series.
A colleague noticed that one of our early images of Peter Gzowski bears a startling resemblance to Jason Lee’s lead character Earl Hickey in My Name is Earl.
Not what I intended to post today, but yeah, I see it. Gzowski always maintained his sense of humour, so I doubt he’d mind. Besides, there are worse things than being loveable and rumpled. Among them, the moustache.
Posted by: Paul Gorbould | 01-24-2007 | 02:01 PM
Posted in: Identical Twins | Comments (0)
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