A half-century of friendship with CJAD radio
Terry Mosher’s editorial cartoons, penned under the name Aislin, have been a fixture of the Montreal Gazette for 50 years. We take a weekly look back at some memorable cartoons in this impressive and vast body of work.
In the 1980s, when editors at the Montreal Gazette spiked a cartoon, I’d fax a copy to CJAD news director Gord Sinclair, who would gleefully describe the cartoon on air. There is no need to do that anymore. When editors choose not to use a cartoon these days, I post it on Facebook and Twitter and ask for readers comments. Where there’s a will, there’s a way.
My association with CJAD goes back almost 50 years, when broadcaster Paul Reid first asked me in for a late-night interview. I showed up with a bottle of Cutty Sark that we polished off at the same time as we finished the interview. Times have changed.
Over the years, I was interviewed countless times by an array of CJAD types. Neil McKenty (“The lines are blazing!”) was a popular talk show host in the 1970s and a backyard neighbour. Neil and I would argue, on the air and off, about the eight cats I owned at the time. Neil and his wife Catherine preferred birds.
Ted Blackman and I shared an ongoing love of hockey, baseball and the blues. In his day, when he was at the top of his game, Ted was the cleverest person I knew in the Montreal media.
However, the person I came to know the most at CJAD was morning man George Balcan. George was the most popular anglophone radio host for three decades and also a very talented artist.
We often vacationed together in Maine, where George was once almost arrested by the Secret Service while sketching in the vicinity of George Bush Sr.’s coastal residence.
It was George who suggested I do a weekly weekend radio show in the mid-1990s that was called Aislin’s Alley. In addition to playing a lot of local jazz, I interviewed many interesting creative people of the day.
I’ve always been friends with Terry DiMonte down the hall at CHOM. More recently, I’ve become fond of current CJAD morning man Andrew Carter. For 10 years now, when I have been in town, Andrew and I have chatted unrehearsed on air every Friday morning for several minutes about whatever is on our minds.
I’ll miss doing this with Andrew, but this will end in 2018 as part of an attempt to slow myself down after 50 years in the business. Well, that’s the plan, anyway.