Peter Worthington

For the Australian cricketer, see Peter Worthington (cricketer).

Peter Worthington (born February 16, 1927) is a Canadian journalist. A foreign correspondent with the Toronto Telegram newspaper from 1956, Worthington was an eyewitness to the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald in 1963, and can be seen in photographs of the event. He remained with the Telegram until it folded in 1971. Worthington was the founding editor of the Toronto Sun newspaper, which was created by former Telegram employees upon that newspaper's demise.

Early life

The son of Major-General F. F. Worthington, Peter Worthington is a veteran of both the Second World War and the Korean War. He joined the Royal Canadian Navy Volunteer Reserve (RCNVR) in 1944 and served as an air gunner in the Fleet Air Arm until his discharge in 1946 with the rank of Sub-Lieutenant.

From there he went to the University of British Columbia. Worthington left the university before completing his degree and joined Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry as a Lieutenant in 1950.

In the Korean War he was a platoon commander, then battalion intelligence officer in the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry (PPCLI) in Korea, and ended the war with the U.S. Air Force, 6147 Mosquito Squadron, directing air strikes at enemy targets.

After his discharge, he returned to the University of British Columbia. He received a B.A. from the University of British Columbia and a bachelor's in journalism at Carleton University.[1].

Toronto Telegram

In 1956 he joined the staff at the Toronto Telegram newspaper. One of early assignments was to cover the Canadian troops stationed in the Gaza Strip. Canadian forces were sent under the directions of the United Nations. From that beginning, he would go on to interview King Hussein of Jordan in 1958, Thomas Anthony Dooley III in 1959, and Albert Schweitzer in 1960.

In April 1961, Worthington was in Algiers, and on May 15, 1961 Worthington was in Luanda, Angola, covering the Portuguese Colonial War. In 1962 he was in Netherlands New Guinea, covering the invasion of the country by Indonesia. He was also in the North East frontier of India and China when Chinese forces invaded in that same year.

On assignment for the Telegram, Worthington was in Dallas on November 25, 1963, where he was an eyewitness to the killing of Lee Harvey Oswald. He covered the trial of Jack Ruby in February 1964.

Starting in January 1965, Worthington was posted in Moscow. In 1967 he was assigned to Cairo, where he covered the Six-Day War. On August 21, 1968 he was in Prague, Czechoslovakia.

Worthington covered the Nigerian Civil War of 1967 to 1970 in a series of reports that resulted in his second of four National Newspaper Awards and a National Newspaper Citation.

Editor of the Toronto Sun

On Saturday September 18, 1971 the Telegram announced it was closing. Joining former employees of the Telegram, a new tabloid was started (the Toronto Sun newspaper), the first edition appearing Monday, November 1, 1971, a day after the last edition of the Telegram. Worthington was the new paper's founding editor-in-chief.

A conservative, Worthington led the brash new tabloid throughout the 1970s as it campaigned against the government of Pierre Trudeau. In 1978 he became the first Canadian journalist to be charged under the Official Secrets Act for a column in the Sun identifying 16 Canadians who had been recruited by the KGB into treasonous acts on behalf of the Soviet Union. After a year of preliminary hearings, the case was thrown out of court.

Following the 1981 police raid of gay bathhouses in Toronto, Worthington, in an editorial and again in an interview with CBC Radio's Sunday Morning threatened to publish the name of future found-ins.

Political career

Worthington stepped down as editor of the Toronto Sun in order to enter politics in 1982. He sought the nomination of the Progressive Conservative Party for a by-election in Toronto's Broadview—Greenwood riding, but was defeated in a hotly-contested campaign in which the six candidates sold thousands of party memberships.

Worthington lost the nomination to Bill Fatsis, who was supported by the riding's large Greek-Canadian population. Worthington then ran as an independent candidate, and placed a strong second to the winner, New Democrat Lynn McDonald. He succeeded in becoming the official Progressive Conservative candidate for the riding in the 1984 general election, but was again defeated by McDonald.

Return to the Sun

After resigning as Toronto Sun editor and taking a leave of absence for his political campaigns, Worthington returned as a columnist for the Toronto Sun and its sister newspapers. In 1989, he was fired by publisher Doug Creighton after being quoted in a rival newspaper saying that the Sun was not a serious newspaper. He was re-hired soon after to be founding editor of the Ottawa Sun for a year, when that paper was relaunched as a daily, and returned to the Toronto Sun and the Sun chain as a columnist. He continues today as a columnist for Sun Media's parent, QMI.

Political views

Worthington is a committed conservative and anti-Communist. Less well known is his support for animal welfare and animal rights and long-time involvement with the Toronto Humane Society. Worthington is also a staunch homophobe, who has used his position in journalism to have such opinion pieces as "The Squalor in Gay Life" written and published.

Alleged FBI informant

Worthington was accused by the Ottawa Citizen of being an informant for the American Federal Bureau of Investigation about the suspected political sympathies of a number of his friends, including June Callwood. Worthington filed a complaint against the Ottawa Citizen with the Ontario Press Council and won a categorical apology for its error.

In 1996 Worthington was inducted into the Canadian News Hall of Fame.

Family

Worthington is married to Yvonne Crittenden and is stepfather of conservative writer Danielle Crittenden, wife of writer and political advisor David Frum.

References

Looking for Trouble, Peter Worthington, 1984, Key Porter Books

External links

• Worthington reporting on the 1981 Toronto bathhouse raids