War on the Air: CBC-TV and Canada’s Military, 19521992 by Mallory Schwartz Thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctorate in Philosophy degree in History Department of History Faculty of Arts University of Ottawa © Mallory Schwartz, Ottawa, Canada, 2014 ii Abstract War on the Air: CBC-TV and Canada‘s Military, 19521992 Author: Mallory Schwartz Supervisor: Jeffrey A. Keshen From the earliest days of English-language Canadian Broadcasting Corporation television (CBC-TV), the military has been regularly featured on the news, public affairs, documentary, and drama programs. Little has been done to study these programs, despite calls for more research and many decades of work on the methods for the historical analysis of television. In addressing this gap, this thesis explores: how media representations of the military on CBC-TV (commemorative, history, public affairs and news programs) changed over time; what accounted for those changes; what they revealed about CBC-TV; and what they suggested about the way the military and its relationship with CBC-TV evolved. Through a material culture analysis of 245 programs/series about the Canadian military, veterans and defence issues that aired on CBC-TV over a 40-year period, beginning with its establishment in 1952, this thesis argues that the conditions surrounding each production were affected by a variety of factors, namely: (1) technology; (2) foreign broadcasters; (3) foreign sources of news; (4) the influence of the military and its veterans; (5) audience response; (6) the role played by personalities involved in the production of CBC-TV programs; (7) policies/objectives/regulations set by the CBC, the Board of Broadcast Governors and the Canadian Radio-Television Commission (later, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission); (8) ambitions for program development and the changing objectives of departments within the CBC; (9) economic constraints at the CBC; (10) CBC-TV‘s relations with iii the other producers of Canadian television programming, like the NFB; and, (11) broader changes to the Canadian social, economic, political and cultural scenes, along with shifts in historiography. At different times, certain of these conditions were more important than others, the unique combination of which had unpredictable results for programming. The thesis traces these changes chronologically, explaining CBC-TV‘s evolution from transmitting largely uncritical and often positive programming in the early 1950s, to obsession with the horrors of war and questioning of the military‘s preparedness by decade‘s end, to new debate about the future of the forces and the memory of war in the 1960s, to a complex mixture of activism, criticism and praise in the 1970s and 1980s, and, finally, to controversy and iconoclasm by the 1990s. iv Acknowledgements Many thanks are due to Jeffrey Keshen, who supervised this thesis. His help and advice were invaluable. I am also very thankful for the feedback provided by Damien-Claude Bélanger, Paul Litt, Eda Kranakis and Mark Stolarik, who graciously took the time to improve my work through their thoughtful examination of my thesis. I also benefitted greatly from the suggestions provided to me by the anonymous reviewers and the editors at the Canadian Historical Review, which published an abridged version of the first chapter in its December 2013 issue. I am truly appreciative for the generous financial support I received from the University of Ottawa and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. I am also indebted to the many people who opened their archives to me, shared their knowledge and gave of their time. For their help, I am thankful to the archivists at: the National Archives (Kew, United Kingdom); the Directorate of History and Heritage at the Department of National Defence (Ottawa); the Harry Truman Presidential Library (Independence, MO); and Library and Archives Canada (Ottawa). I am also grateful for the research assistance provided by John Banfield. Special thanks are due to: Michele Melady at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation; Rob Whitfield of the McMaster University Archives; Anna St. Onge of the Clara Thomas Archives & Special Collections at York University; Brock Silverside at the University of Toronto; Caroline Sigouin of the Concordia University Records Management and Archives; and the staff at the George Metcalf Archival Collection at the Canadian War Museum. I wish to thank Terry Mosher (Aislin) for granting me permission to reprint an editorial cartoon and Brian McKenna for allowing me to publish one of his personal photographs, taken during the filming of The Killing v Ground. The Canadian War Museum and Library and Archives Canada gave me permission to reproduce images from their collections. I also want to thank everyone who considered participating in my research by answering questions about their work with the CBC. A few people who felt unable to contribute nonetheless provided useful information, suggestions or encouragement. Among them were Stanley Burke, Bill Cunningham, Clark Davey, John MacLachlan Gray, Peter Mansbridge, Luise Massari, Bob McKeown, Ann Medina, Knowlton Nash, Kathleen Ruff, Brian Stewart, and Larry Stout. However, I am most grateful to those who took the time to answer my many questions, generously sharing their experiences with me, namely, Philip Anido, David Halton, The Honourable Paul T. Hellyer, Brian McKenna, Ian Parker and John Scully. Lastly, and most importantly, I must thank my parents. In spite of the kind and generous help of so many, I am solely responsible for the contents of this thesis. All errors are my own. vi Table of Contents Abstract ........................................................................................................................ ii Acknowledgements .......................................................................................................... iv Table of Contents ............................................................................................................. vi List of Tables................................................................................................................. viii List of Figures .................................................................................................................. ix Glossary ......................................................................................................................... x Introduction: Television as evidence of ―the world in which we live‖ ............................. 1 Chapter 1: A ―Golden Age‖ of CBC-TV for the Military, 19521956 .......................... 25 Chapter 2: Peril, Fear and Horror, 19561959 ............................................................... 58 Chapter 3: ―[T]here remains a place for the strength and skill and stamina of the fighting infantryman,‖19601961 ................................................................. 99 Chapter 4: ―There is nothing quite as exciting on television as the real world in action,‖ 19611963 ................................................................................................... 126 Chapter 5: Contested Terrain, 19631968 .................................................................... 162 Chapter 6: Austerity and the ―brutalization of society,‖ 19681974 ............................ 200 Chapter 7: Revolutions, Revitalization and Revisionism, 19731984 ......................... 238 Chapter 8: ―[R]elations between the media and the armed forces are not what they should be,‖ 19851992 ............................................................................... 280 Conclusion: War on the Air .......................................................................................... 329 Appendices .................................................................................................................... 340 Appendix A. Contributors ............................................................................................. 340 Bibliography .................................................................................................................. 342 Primary Sources ............................................................................................................ 342 Archival fonds/collections...................................................................................... 342 Videos..................................................................................................................... 342 Other audiovisual and audio sources .................................................................... 359 Newspapers and periodicals .................................................................................. 360 Printed primary sources ........................................................................................ 361 Secondary sources ......................................................................................................... 363 Books ...................................................................................................................... 363 vii Articles and book chapters .................................................................................... 368 Unpublished theses ................................................................................................ 371 Websites ................................................................................................................