Longtime Star journalist ‘ made a difference’
Peter Gorrie was a changemaker and a force to be reckoned with in Canadian journalism, someone who stood up for the underdog and deeply passionate about environmental issues.
Known for his coverage of green technology, renewable energy and the Canadian Arctic, the longtime Star journalist died Monday after a battle with glioblastoma. He was 71.
In his final days, his partner, Denise Morazé, recalls her husband’s fighting spirit, and journalistic passion and curiosity.
“The sad thing is that glioblastoma is located in his temporal lobe, and Peter lost his speech and his ability to write,” Morazé said of the aggressive cancer.
“He approached it like a journalist with curiosity, wanting knowledge about it. But at the same time, he was quiet and displayed a lot of strength.
“I remember him telling me this not long ago, ‘ You have to ask the questions. To get the answers. You have to have lots of questions, to get the answers to decide and to find out what’s important.’
“That’s just the individual that he was.”
Alover of the outdoors, Gorrie met his future wife on a bus en route to a Bruce Trail hiking excursion in the mid- 1990s.
Morazé remembers her husband as fair, ethical and a loving father to her two children.
“He was a communicator and a truth seeker,” she says. “He wanted the work to stand out and have an impact.”
Sandro Contenta, who spent 39 years at the Star, said Gorrie brought distinction and credibility to the newspaper with insightful and rigorous journalism.
“He wrote about complex environmental topics with clarity and precision,” Contenta said. “Anyone who read his stories understood why they, too, should care about humanity’s impact on the planet. He was a caring, thoughtful and decent man who practised the kind of journalism we need more than ever today.”
David Israelson, a former colleague of Gorrie at the Star, also remembered him as a dedicated colleague who paved the way for environmental change.
“Peter and I both reported on the environment and he was the consummate environment reporter. He was dedicated, committed and wise,” he wrote in an email.
“I looked up to him and his work and learned a lot from him and through his work. He made a difference.
“We still have a long way to go toward protecting the environment in Canada, but we’re better because of Peter.”
Gorrie worked at the Star from 1986 until 2008; he was a runner- up in 2004 for a National Newspaper Award in explanatory reporting. Gorrie continued to write for the Star as a freelancer until 2016, covering innovations in green auto.
For years, Gorrie kept readers up to date on the latest alternative fuels and other automotive initiatives to protect the environment in his column, Green Wheels.
Former Wheels editor Norris McDonald remembered an incident when the section used to have a Wednesday deadline. Gorrie would always file a day early.
“A friend of mine had told me about a growing phenomenon in the United States, whereby some anti- environmentalists were tuning their diesel pickup trucks to spew thick, black smoke into the air as they shifted gears,” McDonald said. “I called Peter and asked if he could do a column sometime down the line.
“‘ I know all about that,’ he said. ‘ Hold the column I filed and I’ll have a new one for you tomorrow.’ And like the professional he was, Peter delivered that new column the next morning and was the first journalist to tell Canadians about what came to be known as ‘ rolling coal.’ ”
Longtime Star copy editor Alfred Holden recalled a feature Gorrie did on the 50th anniversary of the St. Lawrence Seaway, comparing it with the Three Gorges Dam in China.
Holden said it was “a wideranging piece that was so impressive that I swivelled happily in my chair, covering off the Canada- China angle but ranging deep, deep into the nature of hydro projects on the face of it so green but disrupted so much.”
Holden marvelled at Gorrie’s skill in informing the reader.
“We all like to tell a story, grab some people with some engaging thought, spin it up nice all good but the duty remains to inform, balance, weigh, give the readers data.
“Peter’s stories were crafted that way.”
Gorrie leaves his wife and grandchildren Jacqueline and Tristan.
A celebration of his life will take place at a later date in Victoria, B. C.