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And Now Heres Max
Now Canadians need no longer wait for the CBC to re-run recordings of Max Ferguson’s notorious radio shows (assuming that the tapes have not all been destroyed by court order). A full dose of his lunacy, depravity, and flagrant disregard for CBC management can now be enjoyed at any hour of the day or night simply by reading a copy of And Now… Here’s Max, his scandalous memoir of a life in broadcasting at the CBC.
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First published January 1, 1967
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
April 5, 2025
BOYS WILL BE BOYS!
A book about the outrageous madcap misadventures of Max (Rawhide) Ferguson and his sidekicks (notably Alan ‘Jellied Gin’ McFee) during CBC Radio Canada’s loony-tunes Golden Years.
Radio in Canada in the old days was anything but adventuresome - except when it came time for the Rawhide show.
Every Sunday night, as my brother and I drifted off to sleep in the 1950’s, we might fitfully hear the opening strains of the Clarinet Polka wafting through the air from the living room hi-fi... my Dad was at it again.
For back then, Max Ferguson’s Rawhide ruled the Canadian Sunday night radio comedy roster!
Later, in the sixties, Max burst into full glory with the CBC rush hour weekday breakfast program, filled with Ferguson’s expert voice caricatures of politicos like John Diefenbaker and Lester Pearson.
Dad used to frantically drive me, Anne and Mary Sue to early-morning high school band practice - with Max’s droll inanity blaring from the speakers of his ‘62 Comet - expertly balancing a buttered piece of toast and marmalade in a napkin on his lap, and chuckling mightily.
But going back to the earlier Rawhide days in the fifties - one glorious Christmas break - work on our cellar rec room had finally been completed, and us kids had a room to play in. What’s more, our Mom had a place for her Christmas cocktail party - which was her way of having our rec room’s Grand Opening that year.
My brother and I went downstairs the next morning - the basement air being still blue from secondhand partygoer’s smoke - and got seriously competitive.
For that was the year we got our NHL Hockey Set for Christmas, complete with movable players and a magnetic puck - and we’d go international, and pick countries, playing each national anthem before our game from a Vanguard anthology on LP.
Hockey, after all, was serious stuff!
Well, boys will be boys - and we’d get tired and cranky - and after Sunday dinner we’d be pretty beat-up and belligerent.
Wintertime cabin fever in our tight little postwar stucco bungalow must shoulder the blame for our fractious flare-ups of sibling rivalry - our parents would deal with us appropriately - and our gales of laughter soon turned to tears.
But as we fell asleep, chastised and disciplined, Dad would be exulting in his newfound liberty again out in the living room.
Chuckling along hilariously once more to Max Ferguson’s Rawhide... alone and quiet, for a change.
His last respite before the Monday morning madness commenced all over again!
A book about the outrageous madcap misadventures of Max (Rawhide) Ferguson and his sidekicks (notably Alan ‘Jellied Gin’ McFee) during CBC Radio Canada’s loony-tunes Golden Years.
Radio in Canada in the old days was anything but adventuresome - except when it came time for the Rawhide show.
Every Sunday night, as my brother and I drifted off to sleep in the 1950’s, we might fitfully hear the opening strains of the Clarinet Polka wafting through the air from the living room hi-fi... my Dad was at it again.
For back then, Max Ferguson’s Rawhide ruled the Canadian Sunday night radio comedy roster!
Later, in the sixties, Max burst into full glory with the CBC rush hour weekday breakfast program, filled with Ferguson’s expert voice caricatures of politicos like John Diefenbaker and Lester Pearson.
Dad used to frantically drive me, Anne and Mary Sue to early-morning high school band practice - with Max’s droll inanity blaring from the speakers of his ‘62 Comet - expertly balancing a buttered piece of toast and marmalade in a napkin on his lap, and chuckling mightily.
But going back to the earlier Rawhide days in the fifties - one glorious Christmas break - work on our cellar rec room had finally been completed, and us kids had a room to play in. What’s more, our Mom had a place for her Christmas cocktail party - which was her way of having our rec room’s Grand Opening that year.
My brother and I went downstairs the next morning - the basement air being still blue from secondhand partygoer’s smoke - and got seriously competitive.
For that was the year we got our NHL Hockey Set for Christmas, complete with movable players and a magnetic puck - and we’d go international, and pick countries, playing each national anthem before our game from a Vanguard anthology on LP.
Hockey, after all, was serious stuff!
Well, boys will be boys - and we’d get tired and cranky - and after Sunday dinner we’d be pretty beat-up and belligerent.
Wintertime cabin fever in our tight little postwar stucco bungalow must shoulder the blame for our fractious flare-ups of sibling rivalry - our parents would deal with us appropriately - and our gales of laughter soon turned to tears.
But as we fell asleep, chastised and disciplined, Dad would be exulting in his newfound liberty again out in the living room.
Chuckling along hilariously once more to Max Ferguson’s Rawhide... alone and quiet, for a change.
His last respite before the Monday morning madness commenced all over again!
February 8, 2008
There have been complaints about how today's boomerang kids are simply refusing to grow up. This whole book is about a bunch of grown Canadian Broadcasting Corporation radio announcers who, over fifty years ago, refused or forgot to grow up. They behave disgracefully anyway and my heart goes out to their long-suffering wives. However, reading about it is a hoot and this is on my list of funniest books ever. To support this, And now...here's Max won the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour in Canada. If that doesn't convince you, try (just try) to read Max Ferguson's account of the campaign to sabotage a Maritime CBC radio programme named Harmony Harbour without snickering...
April 18, 2020
2.5⭐
Accidentally deleted my original review so this is a forensic reconstruction.
I had forgotten this one until I read Fergus' review and the book description. It's a memoir of Max Ferguson's career at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation during its earlier decades, which I read many decades ago, now. I think it would seem badly dated to most readers now, except for nostalgia seekers of that vintage.
It's light hearted and lightweight, describing an era and a CBC now long vanished. There's some celebrity name dropping, as he tells a tale of he and his pal, then aspiring actor Christopher Plummer, playing a pointless prank on Toronto commuters. Many of the anecdotes are along those lines, describing actions that people would now find unprofessional at best, or criminal at worst, such as sabotaging rival reporters. It was a different, more carefree and more forgiving time.
Ferguson does descibe one poignant incident that stuck with me after all these years. He describes his interview with the aged survivor of the Halifax Explosion, a fireman from the first truck to respond to the fire proceeding the blast. I thought he handled that story just right.
Accidentally deleted my original review so this is a forensic reconstruction.
I had forgotten this one until I read Fergus' review and the book description. It's a memoir of Max Ferguson's career at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation during its earlier decades, which I read many decades ago, now. I think it would seem badly dated to most readers now, except for nostalgia seekers of that vintage.
It's light hearted and lightweight, describing an era and a CBC now long vanished. There's some celebrity name dropping, as he tells a tale of he and his pal, then aspiring actor Christopher Plummer, playing a pointless prank on Toronto commuters. Many of the anecdotes are along those lines, describing actions that people would now find unprofessional at best, or criminal at worst, such as sabotaging rival reporters. It was a different, more carefree and more forgiving time.
Ferguson does descibe one poignant incident that stuck with me after all these years. He describes his interview with the aged survivor of the Halifax Explosion, a fireman from the first truck to respond to the fire proceeding the blast. I thought he handled that story just right.
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December 21, 2016By and large I enjoyed this book. It is a memoir originally published in the late 1960s, so I was unfamiliar with many of the references. I'm not sure the author intended some of the impressions I formulated: how unprofessional many early radio personalities were, how things happened without the author blinking his (male) eye but that would actually be classified as sexual harassment in this day and age, how prudish Canadian broadcasting was back in the day, etc. I did laugh out loud over the description of the antics of a ferocious bulldog on an early TV set.
August 12, 2019
A very funny memoir from Max Braithwaite recounting several humorous incidents throughout his broadcast career.
August 12, 2008
A hysterically funny look at operations and characters at CBC Halifax and Toronto in the early days of television. Highly recommend!
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews