SCHLESINGER, JOE

SCHLESINGER, JOE (1928– ), Canadian journalist, broadcaster. Schlesinger was born in Vienna and raised in Bratislava, Czechoslovakia. On June 30, 1939, only 11 years old, he and his younger brother, Ernie, escaped the Nazis, being among 664 children removed to England by young British stockbroker Nicholas Winton. Schlesinger spent the war years in a boarding school run by the Czech government-in-exile. At the end of the war, the brothers returned to Czechoslovakia in a futile search for their parents. Following a bout of tuberculosis, Schlesinger began work in Prague as a translator for the Associated Press but, escaping the Communist takeover of Czechoslovakia, in 1950 he made his way to Canada.

Schlesinger began his journalism career as editor of the campus newspaper while studying economics at the University of British Columbia. From 1955 to 1962 he was a reporter for the Vancouver Province, Toronto Star, and United Press International, and then for the Herald Tribune in Paris until 1966. He found reporting foreign news a calling, "… interpreting it, clarifying it, demystifying it, and making it interesting and relevant."

Schlesinger returned to Canada to begin a more than 40-year career in television at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (cbc). He held several key cbc posts, including executive producer of National News, head of tv News, chief political correspondent, and, notably, foreign correspondent. Schlesinger covered major events around the world, including the Arab-Israeli conflict, often from the heart of the action. Twice a refugee from Czechoslovakia, he returned to Prague to witness the Velvet Revolution that overthrew the Communist regime. "It was," Schlesinger recalled, "one of the great moments of my life. I was able to return, and watch that 'era,' that tyranny – the last of it – vanish. It was a kind of a personal vindication."

After retiring from the cbc news service in 1994, Schlesinger continued to produce and host documentaries, and he remains senior correspondent of cbc's flagship news program, cbc News: The National. His journalism was honored by three Gemini Awards and the John Drainie Award for distinguished contribution to broadcasting. He holds several honorary doctorates, and in 1995 he was named to the Order of Canada. He wrote Time Zones: A Journalist in the World (1990).

[Paula Draper (2^nd ed.)]