Quality Journalism: How Montreal's Quality Dailies
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Quality Journalism: How Montreal’s Quality Dailies Presented the News During the First World War by Gregory Marchand A Thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies of the University of Manitoba in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of MASTER OF ARTS Department of History Joint-Masters Program University of Manitoba/ University of Winnipeg Winnipeg, Manitoba Copyright © 2014 by Gregory Marchand Marchand i Abstract A careful examination of reporting during the First World War by Montreal’s two most respected daily newspapers shows that these newspapers articulated divergent messages about the war and domestic events. Each newspaper had its own political affiliations, and even though they were not always apparent, they were always present, influencing the ways in which each paper approached the war. Each paper’s editorial staff had previously tailored their output to what they perceived to be the tastes and interests of their middle class and elite readerships. This thesis argues that during the First World War, Le Devoir refused to be limited by the traditional impassive reporting style of Montreal’s managerial class newspapers, but the Montreal Gazette did not. Where Le Devoir became more defiant and aggressive in its defence of Francophone rights, the Gazette managed to appear more detached even as it reported the same events. This divergence is important because it represents a larger pattern of wartime change taking place as quality dailies gambled their reputations on the ideals of their owners and editors. Each newspaper carefully constructed their attempts to influence public opinion, but where Le Devoir was responding to what it considered a crisis, the Gazette’s interests and alliances mandated loyalty and a calmer tone. Even though the media are now more concentrated in fewer hands and known for this sort of bias, it was also clearly apparent nearly 100 years ago. Marchand ii Acknowledgements I would like to thank my thesis advisor Len Kuffert for his invaluable guidance and support. He was always ready to help and this thesis would not have happened without him. I would also like to thank my committee members Barry Ferguson, Brenda Austin-Smith, and Alexander Freund, along with all the professors I have known in my undergraduate and graduate career. Each one of you has provided me with the skills necessary to make this work possible. Finally, I would like to thank my friends and family for their tireless support while I neglected them for the sake of this thesis. Marchand iii Table of Contents Abstract .............................................................................................................................. i Acknowledgements .......................................................................................................... ii Table of Contents ............................................................................................................ iii Illustrations ..................................................................................................................... iv Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter One: Quality Dailies, Audiences, and Context ................................................ 16 Chapter Two: Ethnic Strife and Conscription ................................................................. 43 Conclusion: Emotional Times ........................................................................................ 76 Bibliography .................................................................................................................. 81 Marchand iv Illustrations Figure 1.1: From “Try Triscuit To-day,” The Gazette, March 19, 1914 ....................... 24 Figure 1.2: From “Wrigley’s: Avez Vous Soif?” Le Devoir, April 28, 1916 ................ 25 Figure 1.3: From “Molson’s Ale …” The Gazette, June 28, 1915 ................................. 26 Figure 1.4: “Ce Fut Une Grande Victoire!” Le Devoir, October 3, 1916 ....................... 36 Figure 1.5: “The Victory Loan 1918 …” The Gazette, October 26, 1918 ...................... 37 Introduction “But down in the angle at Montreal, on the island about which the two rivers join, there is little of this sense of new and endless space. Two old races and religions meet here and live their separate legends, side by side. If this sprawling half-continent has a heart, here it is. Its pulse throbs out along the rivers and railroads; slow, reluctant and rarely simple, a double-beat, self-moved reciprocation.” Hugh MacLennan, Two Solitudes.1 This thesis seeks to answer the question: how did quality dailies, the most respected and reliable level of daily newspapers, react to the pressures of the First World War in Montreal? Montreal was Canada's most populous city, one of the most important cities for shipping and trade, and one of the most divided cities along both socioeconomic and ethnic lines. The First World War has become vital in the narrative of Canadian history. It is often considered to be an event that acted as a proving ground for the Dominion of Canada, and some have gone as far as arguing that Canada earned it's nationhood on Vimy Ridge. This thesis, however, is not about the battlefields of Europe. It's about the war at home. More specifically, it is about the war going on in daily newspapers, which were the main medium for information available to the general public. Newspapers were the eyes and ears for Canadians, and the most reliable source of news was the quality daily. This reputation left quality dailies with an immense responsibility to their readers to report the news with integrity, but despite this responsibility many quality dailies strayed from their task. This responsibility was not to maintain a completely objective newspaper, but rather to limit the over encroachment of ideology and private interests to prevent the distortion of events. Quality dailies were under pressure to conform to public patriotism, and private interests just like every other news source, which meant that the newspaper's reputation could stand or fall based on the character of its owners and editors. The paths that they chose 1 Hugh MacLennan, Two Solitudes (Don Mills, Ontario: William Collins Sons and Co. Canada Ltd, 1945), 2. Marchand 2 were impacted by their political affiliations, which were exacerbated by the war. To fully explore these paths this thesis brakes down the strategies and tactics that were adopted by each newspaper in their coverage of various issues and events to show how their style was modified. The pressures faced by these stewards of the printed word are very similar to the ones faced by the media today, and by understanding the methods used by newspapers to craft their responses to events in times of turmoil like the First World War we can better understand the pressures that shape the news in every medium tasked with informing the public today. These newspapers did not exist in a vacuum, and thus it is important to first examine the environment in which it they were based. The two newspapers examined here were both founded in Montreal. The city’s proximity to the St. Lawrence River ensured its position as a strategic port, and it featured a strong Anglophone financial presence in the majority Francophone area. The masses of unskilled French Canadians and Irish immigrants made Montreal into one of the cheapest sources of reliable labour in North America. The city was an ideal location for entrepreneurs looking to operate factories close to major shipping routes, while harnessing Quebec’s rivers. Montreal led urban industrialization in the country, and contended with the congestion and squalor it brought. Low pay and insufficient municipal efforts to improve public health combined to create terrible living conditions for the working class.2 This separation between the primarily French Canadian and Irish Catholic workers, and the primarily English Canadian Protestant owners, was a constant source of tension, and a frequent reminder of the barriers to upward mobility that 2 Terry Copp, The Anatomy of Poverty: The Conditions of the Working Class in Montreal 1897-1929 (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart Limited, 1974), 26. Marchand 3 affected Montreal, Quebec, and Canada in the early twentieth century.3 The economic divisions were not absolute. There were also French Canadian business owners, yet the presence and influence of French Canadian business owners, politicians, and clerical leaders could not compete with the sheer financial strength of English speaking interests in the city.4 As early as the 1760s, the Anglophone presence had made English the language of business in the city, meaning Francophones had to learn English to participate.5 The Anglophone dominance of business in Montreal was one of the issues that concerned Canadian nationalist, politician, and journalist Henri Bourassa, a devoted Catholic and a champion of the rights of French Canadians. He was wary of the rapid industrialization of Quebec, which threatened to pull people from the land that his ancestors had worked for generations. Bourassa reluctantly accepted that industrialization was inevitable, but wished to maintain as much of French Canada’s cultural history as possible.6 He accepted the Anglophone presence, but wished for a more equitable relationship between Francophones and Anglophones on all levels of Canadian society.7 Bourassa, along with fellow French Canadian journalists Olivar