VIDEOS: Peter Mansbridge retires: end of an era at the CBC - Part 2

Note from Ed.: This is the continuation and end of our look at the personalities who have anchored CBC-TV's National News (later rebranded as The National) from the beginning until the retirement of the current host, Peter Mansbridge, whose last newscast will air tonight. If you missed Part 1, click here to read that first.

Following the departure of Lloyd Robertson, the CBC resumed its search for a "real journalist", and in 1978 decided on Knowlton Nash, who had decades of experience in print journalism as well as broadcasting. He spent much of the hippy-dippy 1960s in the USA, covering virtually every major story of that time and that place. He stepped down from reporting in 1969 to join CBC's management in Toronto as Director of News and Current Affairs.

In 1978 he auditioned for the role of anchor, and was subsequently chosen. As a nod to his journalistic background, Mr Nash was given the title "Chief Correspondant" rather than "News Anchor". He continued in the role until his retirement in 1988, and died in March of 2014 at the age of 86.

Now it's time to acknowledge the news anchor who had the longest tenure, until Peter Mansbridge came along. That would be the comparatively little known George McLean, who in 1965 took over Rex Loring's role (see Part 1) as backup and weekend anchor. If the "regular" anchor wasn't there, not to worry, because George would get the job done. Known for his reliability and ability to stay calm in high-stress situations, Mr McLean would become one of the most recognizable faces and voices at CBC News. One reason for his success, some say, was that he looked and sounded a lot like Walter Cronkite! Here's a video of his goodbye newscast.



That telecast aired in 1988. George McLean, little remembered now, was on the job for over 20 years! He died in March of 2016, aged 92.

Now we come to Peter Mansbridge, seen here with Knowlton Nash, whose career with the CBC has spanned half a century. Really. As a callow youth of 19, he was working as a dogsbody at the airport at the end of the earth (Churchill MB) when he was called on to make an announcement over the public address system. The station manager for the local CBC affiliate heard his mellifluous tones and hired him on the spot! The rest, as they say, is history.

Peter Mansbridge debuted as the sole anchor of The National on 1 May 1988. He also served as co-anchor for CBC Prime Time News from November 1992 to the fall of 1995. During his 29 years as anchor, he has covered Canadian news stories including federal elections, party leadership conventions, the Meech Lake Accord negotiations, the Charlottetown Accord and its referendum, the 1995 Quebec referendum, floods in Manitoba in 1997, ice storms in Ontario and Quebec in 1998, the six days in September 2000 that marked the death and state funeral of Pierre Trudeau, and the 2003 blackout across much of eastern North America.

He has also anchored coverage of many world events, both in the studio and on the scene. In the studio, he anchored coverage of the Gulf War, the War in Kosovo, the 9/11 attacks and the 2014 Parliament Hill shootings. He was on the air live when the 2003 invasion of Iraq began and anchored coverage of it. On the scene, he anchored coverage of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the funerals of Princess Diana and Pope John Paul II, numerous royal, papal, and US presidential visits to Canada, numerous Olympic Games, and the inauguration of US President Barack Obama. He reported extensively from Normandy both 50 and then 60 years after D-Day and from the United Kingdom and the Netherlands for the 50th and 60th anniversaries.

With the retirement of Lloyd Robertson from CTV National News on 1 September, Mr Mansbridge became the longest-serving active anchor among the big three Canadian networks. Last night the CBC aired a well-deserved tribute to Peter. Here it is.

VIDEOS: Peter Mansbridge retires: end of an era at the CBC - Part 1

So farewell then, Peter Mansbridge. Today will be your last time anchoring The National and telling grateful Canucks "Thanks for watching. Now go to sleep." OK, just kidding about the last part, but Agent 3 assures us that watching Mr Mansbridge read the news is the last thing he does most nights, before turning out the light. So also it has been for millions of Canadians. Now, no more.

Peter Mansbridge first sat in the CBC National News anchor's chair just over 29 years ago. Since then he has become an institution -- a rare thing in the Not-so-great, Not-so-white North -- the Canadian counterpart to the late great Walter Cronkite. In spite of the fact that he spoke for the state broadcaster, Canucks trusted Peter not to lie to them, and he didn't... as far as anyone can tell. People trusted him. The news was what he said it was, no more and no less.

Peter Mansbridge was not the first CBC national news anchor, of course. The CBC's English television service debuted in the fall of 1952. Agent 3 is old enough to remember those early days, and with his help we've put together a photo montage of most of the people who sat at the Big Desk from them until now.

There at the creation (or almost) was Larry Henderson, the only CBC newscaster to sport a dapper pencil moustache, à la Errol Flynn. By all accounts, Mr Henderson was no Errol Flynn, but a serious but pleasant straight shooter, establishing the model for those who would follow. He was the first regular reader of the National News, serving from 1954 to 1959. A devout churchman, he went on to become the editor of the Catholic Register. He died in 2006 at the age of 89.

Special mention must be made here of Rex Loring, a long-time CBC newsie who passed away in April of this year, at the age of 91. (There must have been something in the water at CBC's old Jarvis Street studios in Toronto.)

Known mostly for his work on CBC Radio, Mr Loring filled in for Larry Henderson on weekends and when the latter was off. At one point he even grew a moustache -- no pic could be found -- so he'd be all set to take over when Mr Henderson left, but in vain, as the job went to the moustacheless but more avuncular Earl Cameron. A pic of Mr Cameron proved even harder to find than one of Mr Loring's moustache, but Ed. did manage to locate this very short clip of Earl doing his job.



Earl Cameron succeeded Larry Henderson as the anchor of the CBC National News in 1959. During the 1960s, managers at CBC News moved towards a philosophy of regarding news announcers as journalists rather than performers. As part of this shift, they put pressure on the announcers' union to accept an agreement prohibiting news readers from commercials or accepting outside contracts with ad agencies. In 1965, Mr Cameron gave up reading commercials for such products such as Crest toothpaste and Nash Rambler automobiles, but that didn't save him. He was dropped from the anchor position the following year, but continued as a staff announcer for another decade. He died in 2005 at the age of... wait for it... 89.

There was something of a revolving door (or a revolving chair) at the National News for the next four years, as the CBC kept up its search for a "real journalist" as opposed to an actor or "bingo caller" who just read what was put in front of him. (Rex Loring was the acknowledged master of the "cold read" -- reading convincingly a script which was handed to him while in the middle of a newscast.) Lloyd Robertson had moved to Toronto to host CBC Weekend in the late 1960s, and anchored The National from 1970 to 1976, before jumping to the independent CTV network.

One of the reasons he left the CBC was his frustration at union regulations which confined news anchors to the role of announcer, prohibiting them from writing their own scripts or participating in editorial decisions concerning the news broadcast. Mr Robertson is still alive and, at the age of 83, still appearing occasionally on CTV.

Some of our readers will have fond and funny memories of the SCTV News, a regular shtick on SCTV, the funniest sketch comedy show ever. Eugene Levy's Earl Camembert character on SCTV was named after Earl Cameron, but otherwise bore no resemblance, except maybe for the bow tie that Earl sometimes wore. The name was merely an offhand joke designed to get a laugh from Canadian viewers. The same is true of Camembert's co-anchor, Floyd Robertson, played by Joe Flaherty, who otherwise bore only a small resemblance to Lloyd Robertson.



Note from Ed.: We were originally going to do this tribute to the CBC newscasters as one long(ish) post, but as I did the research, I found so many photos and videos that I've decided to cut the piece into two parts. Scroll up to see Part 2, including a video of the late, unsung George McLean and, yes, more about Peter Mansbridge.

VIDEO: Ann Coulter sez ban on Muslims won the election for Trump

On Tuesday night I found myself flipping back and forth from one lamestream channel to another, not so much to see who was winning, but to see which network would have the most biased (anti-Trump) coverage. The early leader was CBS, which could see The Donald's lead in the "battleground states" building and building, but just wouldn't, couldn't bring themselves to say so.

Their excuses for not "calling it" -- projecting a Trump win -- particularly in Florida, were actually funny. Broward and Dade counties hadn't been fully counted yet because the turn-out was so high. If the margin was 0.5% or less there would be an automatic recount. Court challenges were possible. And so on, until their hand was forced by the other networks.

The worst, though, was CBC -- the Clinton Broadcasting Corporation. Well OK, really the Canadian Broadcorping Castration, which started coverage on its main network a bit late, at 9 P.M. Eastern Time. Their anchor was the venerable Peter Mansbridge, who is regarded by Canadians much as Walter Cronkite used to be by Americans. Peter's the kindly old uncle who tucks you into bed at night with a nice, warm, progressive fairy tale at the end of which the liberals triumph and everyone lives happily ever after.

On November 8th-9th, the liberal dream of eight more years of Democratic rule turned into a nightmare for the CBC's crew of Clinton shills disguised as reporters. Peter was ashen. The smug and condescending Keith Boag actually stuttered. The ever-PC "At Issue" panel had the night off. (I look forward to their "I knew it all along" routine tonight.) To replace them, CBC rang in David Frum, and for balance (LOL) a white liberal woman plus a black lesbian feminist American. Mr Frum didn't gloat. He didn't have to. He just sat there and watched the black gal get crazier and crazier, to the point where the producers wisely cut to something else.

By Wednesday night, Peter had recovered his composure and rehearsed his part of the how-come-we-missed-it routine which will be heard on all networks, American and foreign, for the next year or so. You'll get a taste of it in his interview on The National last night with well-known (even in Canada) American writer and commentator Ann Coulter. She was one of the first credible voices to say "You should have listened to me. I told you so!" She predicted a Trump victory early on, and credited the win to his ability to tap into voters' "pent-up rage for both political parties, mostly over the issue of immigration."

"There are lots of people who do not live in the United States -- billions, I believe. None of them have a constitutional right to move to America," said Ms Coulter. "We've been thinking about the poor illegal aliens and the poor Muslim refugees who aren't living in this country already, but what about the people already here? Immigration is just a government policy like any other government policy, but it's the only one that politicians, and the media, don't even think about saying, 'This should be designed to help the people who are already here.'"

Here's the complete interview.