Joe Schlesinger

Joe Schlesinger
Born	May 11, 1928 (1928-05-11) Vienna, Austria
Occupation	Television journalist, author
Spouse(s)	Myra E. Kemmer
Notable credit(s)	CBC Television CBC Newsworld

Joe Schlesinger, CM (born May 11, 1928) is a Canadian television journalist and author.

He was born in Vienna, Austria, to a Jewish family; his family moved to Bratislava, Czechoslovakia. In 1939, his parents sent him and his brother to a school for Czechoslovakian refugees in Wales organized by Nicholas Winton to escape the threat posed by Nazi Germany. After the war, he returned to Bratislava and found out that his parents had been killed in the Holocaust.

In 1948, he worked as a translator for the Associated Press and soon he left Czechoslovakia for Austria to escape the communists. In 1950, he emigrated to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. He studied at the University of British Columbia.

After spending time as a journalist in Toronto, London and for the International Herald Tribune in Paris, he joined the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in 1966. He retired from full-time employment in 1994, but continues to produce essays and special reports for CBC News. He was a host on CBC Newsworld and producer of commentaries and documentaries for CBC Prime Time News.

In 1990, he wrote his autobiography, Time Zones: a Journalist in the World, which became a bestseller.

In 1994, he was made a Member of the Order of Canada. He was nominated for 18 Gemini Awards and won three awards, for "Best Reportage" (1987 and 1992) and "Best News Magazine Segment" (2004). He was also awarded the John Drainie Award (1997) and "Best Performance by a Broadcast Journalist (Gordon Sinclair Award)" (1987).

On June 7, 2010, he received an Honorary Doctorate of Laws from Queen's University in Kingstonand delivered the convocation speech to a part of the graduating class of 2010 from Queens Faculty of Arts and Sciences. He declared that the students would forget a good part of what they learned but they can find out what they need to know in the realm of facts by "googling it".

On June 8, 2011, he received an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from the University of Alberta in Edmonton for his long and distinguished career. He also delivered a speech to the 2011 graduating class of the Faculty of Arts, impressing on the new alumni that learning is a life-long endeavor, and that one should not be complacent and allow their minds to stagnate. His speech received a standing ovation.