By Rose Simpson
At midnight November 17, 1975, Carleton University embarked on a grand experiment that literally changed the landscape of music in Ottawa. Its campus radio station, Radio Carleton, had just won a coveted FM licence—making Carleton only the second university in Canada to be granted permission to broadcast into the wider community. Before the licence, its broadcast was limited to the university’s maze of tunnels and its residences where the only students who could listen needed plug-in radios.
Today, CKCU-FM is still going strong, still broadcasting an eclectic mixture of music, cultural programming and talk radio. It is set to celebrate its 50th anniversary with a gala, a book and an alumni weekend scheduled for November 14-15.
Fifty-Five Plus writer Rose Simpson recently caught up with some of the original volunteers and staffers who were there on opening day.
Steve Colwill
Steve Colwill won the lottery to become the first voice on CKCU-FM, and officially opened the new FM station by dropping the needle on Joni Mitchell’s You Turn Me On, I’m a Radio.
“It was the first song I could think of that had the word radio in it,” says Steve, who began as a volunteer and went on to a 39-year career at CHEZ-FM. “Back then nobody went to journalism or broadcast school. You learned from your mistakes and you’d either sink or swim.”
Steve came to Carleton from Elliott Lake, Ontario, where his father ran the local newspaper. As a teenager, he became obsessed with the progressive rock music that was being created all over the world, but there was no radio station that played it in his small town. He and his mates would ride around in cars in the evening hoping to pick up signals from the US. They took trips to Toronto and Sudbury to pick up the newest releases and bring them home for their collections.
So when he heard Carleton University had a small, closed-circuit radio station, he packed his bags and moved to Ottawa. That decision changed his life forever.
“CKCU gave me a career,” he says. “It was a stepping stone, and literally changed my life, and I am forever grateful for that.”
Kathie Donovan
Ottawa television personality Kathie Donovan came in search of a connection. After spending her early 20s backpacking and working on a kibbutz, Kathie arrived at Carleton hoping for a career in broadcast.
“The main thing for me then, and now, has been to make people feel they aren’t alone because I felt alone, and radio was my best friend growing up,” says the self-styled happiness expert who spent decades at CTV Ottawa as a journalist and host of Regional Contact.
It was trial by fire at CKCU and Kathie remembers being thrown into the studio so the program director could see if she could cut it.
“I grabbed music at random and mixed a couple of songs, and it worked,” she laughs. “He said, ‘Wow, we have to do this.’”
Paul Park
CKCU gave long-time Parliament Hill journalist Paul Park the opportunity to scratch an itch. He had arrived at Carleton as a political science student with an interest in federal politics and was immediately given a job on a program called Parliament in Review. That experience led him to the Hill where, at 22, he became one of the youngest reporters awarded a Parliamentary Press Gallery pass, which is considered a golden ticket to the “show.” Fifty years later, Paul is still working on the Hill as a reporter for The Wire Report, a subsidiary of the Hill Times.
Ken Ross
Journalism student Ken Ross was another early alumnus who drifted into the CKCU-FM studio looking for a sense of purpose.
“I was intrigued when I heard the first broadcast,” he says. “I wanted an outlet. I realized that journalism was the wrong business for me because I was a writer.”
CKCU allowed Ken to flex his creative muscles and soon he co-created Special Blend, which is a mixture of current affairs, music and comedy. After 50 years, that show is still on the air today. Since graduating from Carleton, Ken has had a successful career in animation, radio and as the director of the museum at the Bank of Canada.
“CKCU changed everything,” he says. “It was a critical time in my life and the friends I made were the people I wanted to hang with.”
Barry McLoughlin
Media expert and radio commentator Barry McLoughlin began his career with CKCU when it was still being broadcast over closed circuit through the tunnels, and into the residences.
“We spent too many hours in the tunnels and, at the time, Radio Carleton was blasting at every intersection in the maze,” he recalls. “That meant that almost every student at Carleton was listening to the only radio station that was playing through the campus.
“It helped me find my voice in comedy and in public presentation as we were working without a script and it helped me move into standup comedy at Yuk Yuk’s in Toronto.”
Before pursuing a career in communications, Barry worked on several successful comedy shows including Ssh it’s the News for Global TV with Ken Shaw and Don Harron.
Years later, Barry passed on his love of campus radio to his son, Brendan McLoughlin, who spent a decade hosting a weekly political commentary program called The Filibuster. Brendan now works in the Canadian film industry.
If you volunteered at CKCU and want to join its Reunion Weekend, more information is available at alumni@ckcufm.com.
