Peter Gzowski: Voice of Canada

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Topic spans: 1966 - 2002

Peter Gzowski: Voice of Canada

For three hours a day, five days a week – for 15 years – millions tuned in to CBC Radio's Morningside and Peter Gzowski. Despite Gzowski's dishevelled appearance, this beloved radio host cast his folksy charm across the country. When Gzowski died in 2002, Canadians paid tribute to the broadcaster whose stammering informality and comforting voice had become a symbol for Canada.

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'A great, great place to be a boy!'

Broadcast Date: Oct. 12, 1997

Peter Gzowski was born on July 13, 1934, in Toronto but grew up as "Peter Brown" in Galt, Ont. Peter was the only child of Harold and Margaret Gzowski who split soon after his birth. When he was four, his mother married Reginald Brown, a textile manufacturer, and moved to Galt, now Cambridge. His mother was a brilliant librarian who made sacrifices so Peter could have a happy childhood. "She sure loved her tow-headed boy," Gzowski recalls in this TV excerpt.

'A great, great place to be a boy!'

• Peter Gzowski was a descendent of Sir Casimir Gzowski. Peter was very proud of his great-great-grandfather, a Polish nationalist, engineer and lawyer, who championed public works in Canada.
• His father, Harold Gzowski, was the black sheep of the Gzowski clan. He was described as an alcoholic who had a hard time holding down a job.

• Peter spent his summers with his Gzowski grandparents at Lake Simcoe while his birth father weaved in and out of his life. It was his grandparents who paid his tuition at Ridley College, a prestigious boarding school in St. Catharines, Ont.
• Gzowski flourished at Ridley — excelling in sports and studies. He won a scholarship to attend the University of Toronto and soon found his calling working as an editor (1955-1956) at the university paper, The Varsity.

• Peter Gzowski was 14 when his mother died suddenly at age 39.
• Two years after his mother's death, he changed his name back to Peter Gzowski.
• At 19, Gzowski got his first newspaper job as an ad salesman for the Timmins Daily Press. A year later, he was working as a police reporter for the Toronto Telegram.

• In 1957, bored with his studies at the University of Toronto, Gzowski quit to become the city editor at the Moose Jaw Times-Herald in Saskatchewan. He was paid $55 a week. Gzowski later said it was the "smartest thing" he had done.

'A great, great place to be a boy!'

Medium: Television

Program: Life & Times

Broadcast Date: Oct. 12, 1997

Guest(s): Peter Gzowski

Host: Anne Marie Macdonald

Duration: 1:59

Credit: Co-produced with Gordon Henderson of 90th Parallel Productions

Last updated:
Jan. 7, 2006

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