Canada moves to 2% GDP end of FY25/26 - PMMC

[YZT580]

The only time that I heard CFRB was when I dialled my transistor radio from CKEY (580 as it then was) to CHUM (1050) and paused for a second on CFRB at 1010. I was a slave to Classic Gold Rock (when it wasn't classic yet but brand new). I still am. My Sirius channel is permanently set to "'60s on 6" (and now "'60s Gold" on 73 since they moved it). CFRB did not do Rock, AFAIK.

True, it did. But the Arrow had been terminated before that.

There was always CHCH in Hamilton, featuring Tiny Talent Time and the Randy Dandy show, for those who didn't watch the Friendly Giant and before that Howdy Doody.

 

[FJAG]

There was always CHCH in Hamilton, featuring Tiny Talent Time and the Randy Dandy show, for those who didn't watch the Friendly Giant and before that Howdy Doody.

Yes. And frequently with better programming than CBC even though it was a CBC affiliate, if I recall correctly. I remember it played some great older (1930s and 1940s) pirate movies from time to time. I'm trying to remember if it also played the Gray Ghost series (which was a CBS production) It might be that the WBEN signal was strong enough by then to make it to our Scarborough antenna.

 

[YZT580]

Yes. And frequently with better programming than CBC even though it was a CBC affiliate, if I recall correctly. I remember it played some great older (1930s and 1940s) pirate movies from time to time. I'm trying to remember if it also played the Gray Ghost series (which was a CBS production) It might be that the WBEN signal was strong enough by then to make it to our Scarborough antenna.

Sad but true. Amazing what effect having to show a profit has on the quality of the product even back then.

 

[KevinB]

You forgot the 'grande dame' of Toronto radio - CFRB.

My memory is the same. CFTO (CTV) went on the air in 1961.



The Arrow became juggernaut in the true sense of the word, driven in no small part by the decidedly un-Canadian personalities of C. D. Howe and Crawford Gordon. Need Titanium? Buy a Titanium mine. It became that ever-enlarging snowball rolling down the hill trying build something cutting edge (for the time) and creating the technology and industry to do it at the same time. The technology was changing quickly and it was an era when military airframes had a lifespan of about a decade.

I'm not sure of the level of paranoia in the US at the time, but it was the height of the Cold War and we were viewed by some as 'Commies'. They didn't want the competition and no other country wanted the aircraft, largely because they were all trying to do the same thing.

It wasn’t an aircraft. It was an airframe.
You can’t sell an airframe. The avionics, radar weaponry was all seriously under developed.

It was like Canada had missed the memo that guns were not the primary anymore.

The weirdest aspect to the cancellation was the destruction of all the blueprints and physical materials for the aircraft.

Feb 1959 wasn’t really the high water mark of paranoia down here either. McCarthyism had been dwindling since 1954 and his censure.
Canada has been seen as a solid partner in Korea and the St Lawrence Seaway has been opened as a peak joint effort.

Later in 1959, after the Arrow cancellation tensions came over Cuba — but from everything I have read, the largest killer of the Arrow was the cost, when combined with the fact the FCS/Weapons where nowhere, and a fast gun jet to intercept bombers didn’t really fill the bill due to ICBM’s.

Many US designs for fast jets adopted radar and missiles to stay viable - and they gobbled up the brainpower from Avro.

 

[brihard]

It wasn’t an aircraft. It was an airframe.
You can’t sell an airframe. The avionics, radar weaponry was all seriously under developed.

It was like Canada had missed the memo that guns were not the primary anymore.

The weirdest aspect to the cancellation was the destruction of all the blueprints and physical materials for the aircraft.

Feb 1959 wasn’t really the high water mark of paranoia down here either. McCarthyism had been dwindling since 1954 and his censure.
Canada has been seen as a solid partner in Korea and the St Lawrence Seaway has been opened as a peak joint effort.

Later in 1959, after the Arrow cancellation tensions came over Cuba — but from everything I have read, the largest killer of the Arrow was the cost, when combined with the fact the FCS/Weapons where nowhere, and a fast gun jet to intercept bombers didn’t really fill the bill due to ICBM’s.

Many US designs for fast jets adopted radar and missiles to stay viable - and they gobbled up the brainpower from Avro.

 

[FJAG]

Later in 1959, after the Arrow cancellation tensions came over Cuba — but from everything I have read, the largest killer of the Arrow was the cost, when combined with the fact the FCS/Weapons where nowhere, and a fast gun jet to intercept bombers didn’t really fill the bill due to ICBM’s.

Many US designs for fast jets adopted radar and missiles to stay viable - and they gobbled up the brainpower from Avro.

Cost - definitely. The argument was that the CF 100s and the Bomarc were enough so why spend money. Shortly after we bought the CF-104 as an interceptor (with guns and rockets and missiles) and then the CF-101 with nuclear missiles. So there's that.