I REMEMBER YOU: PETER C. NEWMAN AND ME

In the course of my often-misguided professional life, I interviewed Peter C. Newman, I worked for Peter C. Newman, I socialized with Peter C. Newman. But in all those years, I never really knew Peter C. Newman and certainly could never figure Peter C. Newman out.

Long, long ago, Peter’s contributions to Canadian journalism were impressive. His nonfiction book, The Canadian Establishment, was groundbreaking. Nobody before had been able to peek behind the curtain of the titans who ran business in this country the way Peter was able to do. Whether he did Maclean’s magazine any favors by reworking a highly regarded monthly totem of journalism into a bi-weekly (and then a weekly) quasi-news magazine is open to question. But there is no doubt Peter transformed it.

The guy who performed these feats as well as at one point running the Toronto Star and writing dozens of bestselling books right up until his death today at the age of 94, was, in my encounters with him at least, a curious, grim, introverted individual. He never quite looked you in the eye and appeared to always wish he was anywhere but where he was.

Watching him in fumbling social interaction at a dinner party he gave, I marvelled all over again at how he ever managed to interview anyone, let alone get inside their world. But somehow, he did, and I was always in awe of that. There was much to admire about Peter; so much to shake your head over.

In the early 1970s I interviewed him and his second wife, Christina McCall, for the Windsor Star. They were known at the time as the power couple of Canadian journalism. A kid who wasn’t much of anything in Canadian journalism, I was nervous as all get out meeting them in Ottawa. They turned out to be friendly and welcoming, Christina particularly. While she was charming and talkative, he was formal and reserved. I thought then that the charm, if not the power of the couple, lay with her, not with him. I was right about the charm, not the about the power.

I’m not sure if it had anything to do with that interview, but much later Peter hired me to write for the newly constituted Maclean’s. I did a lot of pieces for the magazine, but I always had the uneasy sense that he wasn’t all that pleased. Maclean’s in those days was an uneasy place to work anyway, everyone in fear of Peter, including me.

I hadn’t seen Peter for years until I attended a book launch for the late Larry Zolf. I spotted him across the room and thought, well, I’d better go over and say hello. By then he had adopted the trademark Greek fisherman’s cap I would never have imagined the pin-striped, pipe-smoking guy I had first met, ever wearing.

I approached him and held out my hand. “Hello, Peter,” I said. “It’s Ron Base…”

He took my hand, unsmiling, and looked me up and down. “I remember you.” He didn’t sound happy about it.

Gulp…