VANCOUVER - After 47 years of brilliant editorial cartooning, Roy Peterson has been dropped by the Vancouver Sun.
“They told me they couldn’t afford me,” Peterson told The Tyee. “They gave me three months’ notice.” Having worked contractually for the Sun, Peterson has no pension or other benefits.
“They ran a story in the Saturday Sun ,” Peterson said. “But it didn’t say I’d been fired.” The Sun also declined to run his farewell cartoon.
Peterson has won seven National Newspaper Awards and many other honours. He’s been president of the American Association of Editorial Cartoonists and was founding president of the Association of Canadian Editorial Cartoonists. He is also an officer of the Order of Canada.
In addition to his Sun cartoons, Peterson published in all major Canadian periodicals and many US and European media. Between 1978 and 2001, he supplied a cartoon for each of Allan Fotheringham’s columns in Maclean’s—surely the longest collaboration in history between a columnist and cartoonist
What’s next? Peterson said he plans to explore a couple of book ideas over the next year or two. The book series he did with Stanley Burke in the 1970s, including Frog Fables and Beaver Tales and The Day of the Glorious Revolution, was some of the best political satire Canada’s ever seen. And Drawn and Quartered was a highly irreverent cartoon history of the Trudeau years
Hundreds of Roy Peterson’s classic cartoons are available online at Artizans.com.
Contributing editor Crawford Kilian is a longtime Peterson fan.
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buccaneer bay
2 years ago
Go figure.........
He was the only one who constantly critiqued the Campbell goverment regularly..........
Cheers
For a better world
2 years ago
Cartoonists
Cartoonists like Roy Petersen are another casualty of corporate media. More frequently, than not, Petersen's renditions provided the only political truth found in the Vancouver Sun.
zalm
2 years ago
Canwest's toast
There weren't enough reasons to bother reading the Sun, never mind paying for it.
Now there's one fewer.
Hughes
2 years ago
Zalm
Or rather, there was only one reason to bother reading the Sun, never miind paying for it.
Now there's none!
Jeffrey J.
2 years ago
Bob Krieger, Dan Murphy, Roy Peterson
Mr. Peterson is privileged to join the august company of Mr. Krieger and Mr. Murphy, who were also shown the door at the grand CanWestGlobal establishment. You'd think, after the daily losses coming out of this media monopoly, they would have learned by now to KEEP their more intelligent staff, not fire them. But no, it's close the hatch and circle the wagons. Purge all dissidents.
TYEE MODERATOR'S NOTE: ACTUALLY, KRIEGER AND MURPHY ARE STILL EMPLOYED AND CARTOONING FOR THE PROVINCE.
But it will be a loss for those who still read the Sun, as many people have little choice (the Sun is on every corner, in every coffee shop..such is the nature of monopolies). However, I trust this will be a new opportunity for Mr. Peterson to launch into BC's vibrant and exciting independent media.
More great coverage that otherwise would remain cloaked from the public eye.
Wilfred Laurier
2 years ago
Dead Medium
The newspaper is a dead medium. Only large circulation daily papers like the New York Times can survive the internet era. Sure, I enjoyed Petersen's cartoons, but then again I haven't put down my own money for a newspaper for five years. The Sun and Province are so bad they aren't worth $1.25
Rod Smelser
2 years ago
If it's that dead
Wilfred Laurier
The newspaper is a dead medium.
Fake rejoinder, Wilfred. If the newspaper industry is dead, how does if fire someone?
blackie
2 years ago
Can-West
This is just the beginning. Once Can-West has sorted out it's debt/bondholder issues (either with or without bankruptcy protection) you'll see a serious attempt at cost-cutting.
In Vancouver, that will mean ditching one of the two newspapers, or perhaps merging them into a Sun-Province or Province-Sun. Whether it's tabloid or broadsheet, I'm not sure -- but I'd lean towards tabloid since Metro will become an increasingly transit-based commuter city over the next couple of decades.
It makes no business sense whatsoever (and remember this is a business not a charity) to perpetuate the double overhead of running two papers with two separate editorial departments. And I suspect that daily switch on the presses from tabloid to broadsheet and back has its own unique costs, along with the extra newsprint costs from putting out two products.
There was a time when Southam wanted to maintain both papers to ensure that no competitor would encroach on its turf. That's not a problem any more -- who in his right mind would want to launch a newspaper anywhere in North America.
The unions will fight it, but they won't have much clout. If you look at the editorial staffs of both papers there's an awful lot of lifers there who will decide, with the right package on the table, that this is a good time to go.
MichaelT
2 years ago
is there a link to his final
is there a link to his final drawing?
Crawford
2 years ago
Alas, no...
Peterson has decided to hold on to his last Sun cartoon.
Wilfred Laurier
2 years ago
Not Quite Dead
"If the newspaper industry is dead, how does if fire someone?"
Ok, not dead, but dying. Soon dead.