George Garrett

George Garrett (1934 – 18 March 2024)

Because I am 81, my concept of radio is that from the last century. I am unable to adjust to listening to CBC Radio in my car and having to suffer the messy situation of the two bridges linking our city with North Vancouver.

For me radio, or my awareness of its importance began in Buenos Aires on July 26, 1952. From that day, and for a year, on every evening, on any radio station (my mother liked to listen to LRA Radio del Estado, a sort of CBC with no bridges) all programs were interrupted). I would hear, “Son las veinte y veinticinco, hora en que Eva Perón entró en la inmortalidad,” or, it’s 20:25  the hour in when Eva Perón entered immortality.

Since that day I loved radio. When Rosemary and I were living in Mexico City (1968/75) we liked to listen to a station that was in English and on the hour it linked to CBC Radio in the US. It was in this station that I first heard and appreciated Dan Rather and laughed at the humour of Nicholas von Hoffman (“If you really want a kid, buy a baby goat.”)

And once in Vancouver, thanks to Malcolm (Mac) Parry’s Vancouver Magazine, I was able to photograph the “Captains of the Air” in 1984. See article and photos below this blog.

I have no recollection of the date, or what we spoke about, when I was assigned to photograph one of those last captains of the air, George Garrett, who died today. I have a vague memory that not too long ago, here in my Kits home, I was visited by him and a friend (and a friend of mine) George Planta. One word creeps in my mind when I think of Garret - intrepid.

I miss the fabulous diction of announcers like Barbara Budd and the humour of Bill Richardson (his program Bunny Watson inspired me to write in the way I write my blogs with what some might say is a distant association of this and that).

But I have a happy announcement to make here. I am a fan of a CBC Radio announcer called Neil Herland who has an accent most similar to that of CBC’s The Man of the Movies, Rick Staehling, who is sadly no longer with us. Herland sounds American just like Staehling. I can hear him on some early evenings and he is based in Montreal.

I have a secret to report here. That Captain of the Air, CBC’s Gloria Macarenko , when I see her in person, usually dining at la Bodega we converse in Spanish. Her diction in that language is perfect.

Gary Bannerman

Pat Burns

Barrie Clark

Jack Webster