Two decades in, Williams shows no signs of slowing down
Herald automotive journalist overcame obstacles to pen 1,000 stories and counting
For as long as he can remember, Greg Williams has had a love for motor vehicles of all kinds. “I always had an interest in anything on two wheels,” says the Calgary Herald’s automotive journalist of the past 20 years. In time, that would grow to include cars and trucks, “anything vintage.”
Landing a gig as a writer focused on his life’s passion, then, was an obvious case of dreams coming true; and winning a major award for his first paid assignment for a British motorcycle magazine in the mid-1990s, proof positive that he turned onto the right road.
On Friday, the Herald will publish Williams’ 1,000th column, one that in recent years has enjoyed a national audience on Postmedia’s wire service.
“I don’t really feel comfortable tooting my own horn,” says the soft-spoken, self-described Type B personality.
This Herald writer, however, has no qualms about doing the horn tooting on behalf of the native Calgarian. Over the past two decades, Williams has distinguished himself as one of the top automotive writers in the country, his articles on motorcycles and riding being regular staples of some of the best-known trade magazines around the world. He’s won several awards for his writing, including the Bar and Hedy Hodgson Award, given out annually by the Canadian Motorcycle Hall of Fame.
The fact that two-thirds of that illustrious career has been plied from a wheelchair, says Williams, is no big deal.
“I’m a writer, I can type on a laptop, do phone interviews,” he says nonchalantly as we chat in one of the garages of his southwest Calgary home, this one his main studio for tinkering and rebuilding — with the help of friends, he’s clear to note — such vintage beauties as the 1958 Triumph TR6B Trophy motorcycle that sits in the middle of the room.
“Luckily, I wasn’t a tradesman, I wasn’t an electrician,” says Williams, who became a paraplegic in 2004 after crashing his motorcycle. “I thought I was too shy to be a journalist. Then I learned that everyone has a story to tell, if you stop and listen.”
Williams’ own story is one with its share of ups and downs, his positive outlook today a testament to his ability to take on whatever life throws at him.
In his teen years, he didn’t envision having a career one day that he would love. “I dropped out of high school, then went back,” says Williams, who bought his first minibike at age nine, his first dirt bike at 11 thanks to earnings from a Calgary Herald delivery route. “I kind of lost the plot there for six or seven years in my late teens.”
He worked for a time in the restaurant industry, not entertaining the thought of post-secondary education until his early 20s, when he enrolled in Mount Royal University’s journalism program.
The inspiration for his first, award-winning magazine article after school came from a friendship with Saskatchewan-born, Calgary-based Bernie Nicholson, a legend in the motorcycle business who penned the industry bible, Modern Motorcycle Mechanics.
Years later, Williams would author the book Prairie Dust, Motorcycles and a Typewriter: The Story of Bernie Nicholson and Modern Motorcycle Mechanics.
The Herald gig came about, he says with a laugh, after he continually pestered Jack Spearman, then-editor of the paper’s former Wheels section. “He finally called up one day with an idea for a column,” Williams says with a smile at the memory. “There weren’t really a lot of parameters to it.”
His happy life and career could have ground to halt in the fall of 2004, when, during a ride with friends to Canmore, Williams lost control of his Suzuki motorcycle and crashed into a ditch.
“I couldn’t have done this without Linda,” he says of Linda Soby, his partner of more than a quarter of a century. Williams also credits Herald managing editor Monica Zurowski and then-features editor Lisa Monforton, who encouraged him to return to column writing; he was back at work by the summer of 2005.
“Test driving is a visceral experience,” says Williams, who stopped doing test-drive reviews after his accident. “Lisa had the idea to do the regular reader review, where I would interview them about their experience.”
The couple purchased a wheelchair-friendly home in the southwest, a place that also won over Williams for its four-car garage, even though he doesn’t drive. “Lots of space to tinker,” he says.
While the 1,000th column is a major milestone, Williams hopes to keep plugging away at his beloved profession for years to come.
“As long as I can keep writing,” he says with a smile, “my hand will be on the throttle.”
I thought I was too shy to be a journalist. Then I learned that everyone has a story to tell, if you stop and listen.