GZOWSKI o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-01-24 published
Died
This
Day -- Peter
GZOWSKI, 2002
Friday, January 24, 2003, Page R15
Broadcaster and writer born in Toronto on July 13, 1934; edited
the student newspaper at the University of Toronto and went on
to edit several small-town Ontario newspapers; in 1962, became
managing editor of Maclean's magazine; in 1971, moved to Canadian
Broadcasting Corporation and This Country in the Morning; filled
series of host positions, including Morningside; retired in 1997
wrote string of bestsellers.
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GZOWSKI o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-04-22 published
He founded Readers' Club of Canada
Nationalist visionary struggled financially to publish Canadian
writers
By Carol COOPER
Special to The Globe and Mail Tuesday, April
22, 2003 - Page R7
In the early 1960s, when writers asked Peter and Carol
MARTIN
where to publish their manuscripts on Canada, the couple realized
how few choices there were. Inspired, the Martins, both voracious
readers, staunch nationalists and founders of the Readers' Club
of Canada, decided to start their own press. In 1965, Peter Martin
Associates came into being. Last month, Peter
MARTIN died of
lung cancer in Ottawa.
In an industry overshadowed by American companies, Peter
MARTIN
Associates was among the first in a wave of independent publishing
houses to open during a time of rising Canadian nationalism.
Launched in a downtown Toronto basement on a shoestring budget,
skeleton staff, idealism and enthusiasm, the company flew by
the seat of its pants. Its employees were often young and new
to the business. But many, including Peter
CARVER,
Michael
SOLOMON
and Valerie
WYATT, went on to become Canadian mainstays.
"It really was a time of Canadian nationalism and those of us
who believed in that cause could see what Peter and Carol were
doing," said Ms.
WYATT, a children's editor who spent four years
with the company in the seventies.
During the 16 years before its sale in 1981, Peter Martin Associates
published approximately 170 works, mainly non-fiction. Its presses
put out I, Nuligak, the autobiography of an Inuit man; The Boyd
Gang by Marjorie
LAMB and Barry
PEARSON;
Trapping is My Life
by John TETSO; and the Handbook of Canadian Film by Eleanor
BEATTIE.
Others who came through their doors included Hugh
HOOD,
Robert
FULFORD, John Robert
COLOMBO, Douglas
FETHERLING and Mary Alice
DOWNIE -- all to have their works published.
Started with small amounts of seed money from private investors
and no government funding, Peter Martin Associates constantly
struggled financially. At one point, for a bit of extra cash,
the office became the designated nuclear-fallout shelter for
the street. Pat
DACEY, once the firm's book designer, lugged
suitcases of books up the street to sell at Britnell's bookstore
with summer employee Bronwyn
DRAINIE.
Working at Peter Martin Associates was always fun, Ms.
WYATT
said. "You went in to work happy and you stayed happy all day."
Still, in a time when Canadian works received little recognition,
she remembers finding it difficult to get media interviews for
the author of Martin-published book.
Yet another title caused trouble with its subject. The company
was putting out a collection of previously published sayings
of former prime minister John
DIEFENBAKER, called I Never Say
Anything Provocative, edited by Margaret
WENTE. Mr.
DIEFENBAKER
heard about the project, called Mr.
MARTIN and threatened to
sue. Mr. MARTIN stood firm.
"He handled it with such élan," said writer Tim
WYNNE-
JONES,
then in the art department. "He was suitably dutiful, but not
in awe. Mr.
DIEFENBAKER was just over the top, as was his wont."
The book went to press and Mr.
DIEFENBAKER did not go to court.
Once listed along with Peter
GZOWSKI in a Maclean's magazine
article on "Young Men to Watch," Mr.
MARTIN was born on April
26, 1934 in Ottawa to a dentist father and a mother who drove
an ambulance in the First World War. The younger of two sons,
he attended Trinity College School in Port Hope, Ontario and
the University of Toronto, where he earned a degree in philosophy.
During a year in Ottawa as the president of the National Federation
of University Students, Mr.
MARTIN met his first wife
Carol.
They married in 1956 and moved to Toronto. Three years later,
they founded the Readers' Club in Featuring one Canadian book
a month, it distributed works by Mordecai
RICHLER,
Irving
LAYTON,
Morley CALLAGHAN and Brian
MOORE among others, and supplied its
members with coupons. While continuing to run the Readers' Club
(sold in 1978 to Saturday Night Magazine and closed in 1981),
the MARTINs started Peter Martin Associates.
Throughout his career, Mr.
MARTIN spoke out for Canadian publishing.
Alarmed by the sale of Ryerson Press and Gage Educational Press
in 1970 to American firms, he called a meeting of publishers
to discuss problems in the industry. Named the Independent Publishers
Association, the group started in 1971 with 16 members and with
Mr. MARTIN as its first president. In 1976, it was renamed the
Association of Canadian Publishers and continues today with 140
members. As a result of the group's efforts, Canadian publishing
began to receive federal and provincial funding.
In the late 1970s, the
MARTINs went their separate ways. Afterward,
Mr. MARTIN published a small newspaper, The Downtowner, and owned
a cookbook store with his second wife, Maggie
NIEMI. In 1983,
they moved near Sudbury, Ontario, where Mr.
MARTIN did freelance
book and theatre reviews, then moved to Ottawa in 1985 to work
as president for Balmuir Books, publisher of the magazine International
Perspectives and consulting editor for the University of Ottawa
Press.
After a spinal-cord injury in 1997, Mr.
MARTIN was left a quadriplegic,
except for limited use of his left arm. Even so, he remained
active, maintained a heavy e-mail correspondence and spent time
in the park reading while seated in a bright-yellow wheelchair.
Mr. MARTIN leaves his children Pamela, Christopher and Jeremy
and his wife
Maggie
NIEMI. He died on March 15.
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GZOWSKI o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-07-24 published
Ian ROSS
By David ROSS
Thursday,
July 24, 2003 - Page A18
Son, brother, uncle, friend, wildlife biologist. Born December
16, 1958, in Goderich, Ontario Died June 29, near Nanyuki, Kenya,
in a light-aircraft accident, aged 44.
Ian ROSS died at the peak of his career, doing what he loved.
Born in Southern Ontario, he was a true outdoorsman from the
beginning, running a trapline even during high school. He graduated
from the University of Guelph with an honours degree in wildlife
biology in 1982. There being few jobs in his chosen profession
at that time, he was a lost soul when he drove his pickup truck,
packed with all of his possessions, out to Alberta looking for
work. A short stint working as a beekeeper in Peace River was
followed by his being hired as a wildlife biologist by a small
private consulting firm in Calgary. His joy was quickly, and
prophetically, short lived when his mentor died in a plane crash
while conducting a wildlife survey in the Rockies shortly after
Ian started work.
Ian and a colleague continued the firm, conducting environmental
impact studies in Western and Northern Canada for government,
the oil industry and, latterly, Canada's fledgling diamond industry.
While rapid expansion of human activities in these areas had
put his services in great demand lately, it was not always so.
In the early years, Ian and his partner filled their spare time
conducting a non-funded study of cougars in the area southwest
of his home in Calgary. His work on the cougar project received
national recognition as he appeared on Canadian Broadcasting
Corporation's Morningside with Peter
GZOWSKI. Arthur
BLACK followed
along while the partners radio-collared a cougar and recorded
the event for an episode of Basic Black. Last year, he did a
Discovery Channel show on the great bears.
A true, committed conservationist, Ian did not fit the typical
mode. He hunted, legally, deer and moose for his own table. One
never knew what to expect for dinner at Ian's and usually didn't
ask. At the same time, he vigorously opposed the senseless trophy
killing of wolves, bears and cougars. He was a major researcher
on the eastern slopes grizzly-bear project currently underway
in Alberta and British Columbia. His work with cougars led the
Alberta government to introduce a conservation plan for these
animals.
At one time a bit of a loner, Ian had grown to become a committed
and emotional friend and family man. Having no children of his
own, he was a hero to his young nieces, nephews and children
of Friends who thought that his was the most important job of
all. What uncle could match Ian when he produced the perfect
fossilized albertasaurus tooth found on one of his Alberta expeditions?
Last year, Ian was approached to lead a study of large African
predators, funded partly by the University of California and
the National Geographic Society. Ian's time was largely volunteered.
The purpose of the study was to learn how to reduce the number
of domestic livestock killed by these magnificent animals so
that the local farmers, some of the poorest on Earth, would not
have to kill the lions, leopards and hyenas. Ian understood that
if these predators were to survive in the long run they had to
be able to exist outside of the national parks or face extinction
due to inbreeding.
Ian's dry sense of humour was famous. We will never forget the
letters describing the goat stew (scavenged from a lion kill)
or the haircut performed by his mechanic.
Two days before his death he was on top of the world having collared
his first leopard and was busy planning for our families' upcoming
trip to visit him at the research station in August. On the evening
he died, Ian was tracking a radio-collared lion from a light
aircraft. Its wreckage was located by searchers the next morning.
As he wished, he was cremated and his ashes dispersed in Kananaskis
country where he had spent so much time with his cougars.
David ROSS is Ian's brother.
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GZOWSKI o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-07-28 published
He had a passion for big cats
Canadian wildlife biologist pioneered long-running cougar project,
radio-tracked lions in East Africa
By Allison
LAWLOR
Monday,
July 28, 2003 - Page R7
Ian ROSS, a Canadian wildlife biologist whose love of big cats
took him deep into the bush in East Africa, has died after his
small plane crashed in central Kenya. He was 44.
Mr. ROSS was radio-tracking lions in Kenya's Laikipia district
as part of a research study aimed at improving the conservation
of large carnivores in Africa, when the two-seater Husky aircraft
he was a passenger in crashed and burned.
The plane, which was flying at a low altitude in order to allow
him to track the animals, crashed in the early evening of June
29. Mr. ROSS and the American pilot who was flying the plane
were killed instantly, said Laurence
FRANK, director of the Laikipia
Predator Project and a research associate at the University of
California at Berkeley.
Mr. ROSS, who arrived in Kenya from Calgary in January, had intended
to stay there working on the project for at least a year.
"He had this real passion for big cats. He wanted to study them
around the world," said Vivian
PHARIS, who sits on the board
of directors at the Alberta Wilderness Association, of which
Mr. ROSS was a member for close to 20 years.
"Large carnivores are interesting because their populations tend
to be the first to suffer from human activities," Mr.
ROSS said
a few years ago in a short article written on the occasion of
a high-school reunion. "They require huge land areas and some
of their characteristics are very similar to and conflict with
our own."
Although Mr.
ROSS had spent considerable time in the field researching
several wild animals, including lions, grizzly bears and moose,
Mr. ROSS was best known for his expertise on cougars.
In the mid-1990s, he and colleague Martin
JALKOTZY, with whom
he ran a small Calgary-based consulting firm called Arc Wildlife
Services, completed a 14-year study on cougars.
The study, considered the longest-running cougar project and
the most intensive of its kind, looked at everything from cougar
population dynamics, to the effects of hunting, to food and habitat
use.
The intensive fieldwork took place in the winter in the foothills
of Alberta. Winter allowed the researchers to follow a cougar's
tracks in the snow. Once a cat was tracked, with the help of
dogs, the animal would be tranquillized before it was radio-collared
and its measurements were taken.
"We worked really well as a team," Mr.
JALKOTZY said. "It was
something Ian did quite well."
The cougar project received wide public attention when Mr.
ROSS
appeared on Canadian Broadcasting Corporation Radio's Morningside
with Peter
GZOWSKI and Arthur
BLACK, the former Canadian Broadcasting
Corporation
Radio host, followed along with Mr.
ROSS and Mr.
JALKOTZY while they radio-collared a cougar. Mr.
BLACK recorded
the event for his program Basic Black.
In the mid-1980s, not long after Mr.
ROSS became involved in
the study, he lost his friend and mentor Orvall
PALL.
Mr.
PALL
was killed in a plane crash while tracking bighorn sheep in Alberta.
At the time of his death he was working with Mr.
ROSS and Mr.
JALKOTZY on the cougar project.
Over the years, Mr.
ROSS, who was described as quiet and unassuming,
made a number of public presentations on the cougar study. He
was especially in demand in 2001 after a woman was killed by
a cougar while cross-country skiing near Banff, Alberta.
"Ian really believed in public education," believing it was the
first step toward conservation, Mr.
JALKOTZY said. Speaking publicly
also helped to raise money, from individual donors, corporations
and other sources, for the independent study.
Mr. ROSS also did a lot of work with Alberta Fish and Wildlife
and was instrumental, along with Mr.
JALKOTZY, in getting the
province to adopt a new cougar wildlife management plan to control
hunting.
Ian ROSS was born on December 16, 1958, in Goderich, Ontario
He was the third of four children born to Burns and Ruth
ROSS.
Childhood was spent in the fields of Huron County near his home,
climbing through muskrat swamps and collecting pelts and animal
skulls.
After high school, Mr.
ROSS left Goderich for Guelph, Ontario,
where he studied wildlife biology. In 1982, he graduated from
the University of Guelph with an honours degree. Soon after,
he packed up his pickup truck with all his possessions and drove
west to Alberta. After a short stint working as a beekeeper in
the Peace River area, he was hired by a small private consulting
firm in Calgary as a wildlife biologist and started studying
grizzly bears and moose.
In 1984, he married Sheri
MacLAREN, also from Goderich. The couple
separated in January, 2002.
Over the course of his career, Mr.
ROSS figured he had captured
and released more than 1,000 large mammals including bighorn
sheep, cougars and grizzlies, for research. Not afraid of large
animals, he captured and collared his first leopard two days
before he died.
Andrew ROSS recalls one time his older brother was injured by
a moose when it kicked him in the face after being sedated. He
was left bruised and with a cracked cheekbone.
"He was extremely meticulous and careful," Dr.
FRANK said, referring
to Mr. ROSS's work.
Through his consulting firm, Mr.
ROSS conducted numerous environmental
impact studies in western and northern Canada for the oil industry
and government. The work required Mr.
ROSS to spend a lot more
time at his office desk instead of in the field where he felt
his true talent was.
"Working with these large animals is very exciting and also very
dangerous," Dr.
FRANK said.
Mr. ROSS loved being in the field but hated what he had to do
to the animals. He knew that by capturing the large predators
he was causing them trauma, but he strongly believed that what
he was doing was for the benefit of research and in the end the
benefit of the animals, Dr.
FRANK said.
"He was just so aware of the animal's experience, the animal's
dignity, if you can put it that way," Dr.
FRANK said.
Mr. ROSS spent the spring of 2002 working in northern British
Columbia capturing grizzly bears for research. The job meant
Mr. ROSS, a man small in stature but strong and wiry, and a pilot
would fly low over an area in a helicopter trying to spot bears.
Once they had, Mr.
ROSS's job was to lean out of the plane, secure
in his harness and dart the animal with a tranquillizer. After
the animal was sedated, they would circle back, land the plane
and eventually radio collar the animal.
"He had great capture skills," Mr.
JALKOTZY said.
Aside from being a committed conservationist, Mr.
ROSS was also
an avid hunter and enjoyed hunting elk, moose and deer. But he
vigorously opposed the trophy killing of wolves, bears and cougars.
Andrew ROSS recalls that when his brother went moose hunting,
deep in the woods, he would only bring three bullets with him.
He figured that if he couldn't kill an animal with those, he
didn't deserve to get one.
"He would often get the moose with one bullet," Andrew
ROSS said.
While he loved to hunt, he never went out in an area he was studying,
considering that to be a conflict of interest, his brother said.
"Ian cared passionately about wildlife and wild country," and
tried to do what he could to conserve it, Mr.
JALKOTZY said.
Next month, Mr.
ROSS's ashes will be dispersed in Alberta's Kananaskis
country, where he had spent so much time with the cougars.
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