Archive for June, 2011

Some things in life are immutable. Conrad Black is among them. You have to admire the force of his personality even as he heads back to prison flinging emails to inquiring journalists that resonate with phrase-making from on high. The sentence was no surprise; I look forward to prison; my efforts have changed the system; my wife is fine.

I first met Black in 1978. I had just joined Maclean’s as business editor when his purchase of Argus Corp. became public and thus began his rise to fame and fortune. He was refusing all interviews. For my first story in Maclean’s (then biweekly heading for weekly publication in the fall) I wrote a piece on GATT. For the next issue, I resolved to write about something more scintillating than international trade so I found out where his office was located (a shared facility at Dominion Securities) in Commerce Court, presented myself, and was told he was too busy to see me. Reassured that he was enthroned inside, I told his secretary I’d be happy to wait. I sat outside his office from 1:30 p.m. until about 5:45 p.m. Finally, I was ushered in.

“I suppose you’re here to talk about Duplessis,” he said, referring to his recently published book on the Quebec premier. He then held forth for more than two hours with detail piled upon detail about how he’d landed Argus and sent me away with telephone numbers for various contacts and colleagues including Nelson Davis, who would serve as his chairman and was traveling in Ireland.

When I called a few days later to set up a photo shoot, his helpfulness continued. He asked that his brother Monte be included and gave me his number, too. “Tell him I advised you about the merits of this photograph,” he said, which seemed to be some sort of code between the two. Monte showed up at the appointed hour. The article was published as the cover story in the June 26th issue with a dramatic color shot of Black, leaning on a desk, propped by his clenched fists, under the cover line, “The Argus Grab.”

So eager was Black to see the finished story that he arrived unannounced at Maclean’s office in order to get an early copy. My son, Mark, then an aspiring photographer, happened to be visiting, rode down on the elevator with Black, and asked Black if he could take his picture. Black agreed, and the result was a smiling shot on the sidewalk holding an open magazine with himself on the cover .

His symbiotic relationship with the media, indeed his insatiable hunger for a public profile, has not changed all these 33 years later.

Among all the senior bankers of recent vintage, Don Fullerton possessed the most grace and the quickest wit. As a sometime thorn in the side of the banks, I had been particularly scathing in my books and magazine pieces over the years about Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) where Fullerton was chairman and chief executive officer from 1985-1992. As far as I was concerned, CIBC was the worst run and the most political – a toxic combination – of the Big Five Banks. CIBC always seemed to be the last bank in the door with the biggest wheelbarrow full of money for companies about to implode: Massey-Ferguson, Dome Petroleum, Olympia & York.

In the mid-1990s we both attended a cocktail party at the home of a mutual friend. I found myself as part of a conversational bouquet on the patio with him during that warm summer’s evening. Fullerton looked at me disapprovingly across the circle of eight people and set out to skin me alive with witnesses. “McQueen, I can’t begin to tell you how much you’ve got wrong about banking over the years. I don’t know where you get your information but it certainly couldn’t have been from anyone who worked at the banks. Do you just make things up?”

“Well,” I replied, “I’d be happy to sit down with you and go through these mistakes you claim I made and see what you’re talking about.”

“Do you know how long that would take? Do you think I’ve got that kind of time to spend with the likes of you?”

He continued in that vein for a while. I smiled through it all and so did he. The following week I phoned him, offering to buy lunch. He accepted. And so began the most unlikely friendship that continued over an annual lunch most years since. He ended up telling me a lot about banking but I also heard about many other things including the Li Ka Shing Foundation where he was a director and all the good work the foundation was doing. We didn’t always see eye-to-eye on issues, but we agreed on more than either of us could ever have imagined, and we always had a stimulating conversation, the likes of which are all too rare.

I last saw him a couple of months ago. “Call me for lunch,” he said. I’ve been busy about other matters and didn’t get to it. I missed my opportunity for a last lesson from my belated mentor, who, despite what he said at that reception, ended up taking the time to teach me a lot. And it was my turn to buy, too, a fact he likely would have had in mind when he invited me to call.

Sandy, my wife and high school sweetheart, died peacefully at home on Tuesday, May 24, 2011. Sandy was the loving mother of Mark (Andrea Whiting) of Toronto, and Alison (Ken McLeod), of Hamilton; beloved sister of Robert Illingworth (Sharon) and John Illingworth (Elizabeth) of Thunder Bay; proud and fulfilled Pippa of Molly and Emerson. Sandy was a woman of high spirits, eternal optimism, common sense and an old soul with the touch of a rebel. If anyone needed a friend, they could always turn to her knowing that she would not only listen but also offer wise advice. Sandy lived many lives and excelled at them all: primary school teacher, interior designer, real estate broker, and art student. In 2000 she enrolled at the Ontario College of Art and Design to unleash the skills that would allow her innate artistic talents to flourish. In no rush to finish what would normally have been a four-year program, Sandy graduated with her diploma in 2010 and loved every moment with her far younger fellow students. Member of the Garden Club of Toronto and an honorary Southern Belle of the Washington, D.C. chapter. Remembrances may be made to the Sandy McQueen Memorial Scholarship Fund, OCAD University, Development Office, 100 McCaul St., Toronto, Ont., M5T 1W1.