FIL FRASER has been a life-long broadcaster, journalist, television
program director and administrator, and a radio, television and feature
film producer. Based in Edmonton, Alberta, he is the author of the best
selling memoir, Alberta’s Camelot – Culture and the Arts
in the Lougheed Years and Running Uphill – the Fast, Short Life
of Harry Jerome, a biography of the Canadian Olympic sprinter. The rights
to produce a feature documentary based on the biography have been optioned
by the National Film Board of Canada.
Fraser
is an adjunct professor of Communications Studies at Athabasca University,
Canada’s pioneering distance learning institution. He has served
as a member of the Board of Directors and Vice-Chair of Telefilm Canada.
He was the founding Chair of the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts
Awards Foundation, created under the patronage of the late Lieutenant
Governor, Hon. Lois E. Hole. He is a member of the Order of Canada,
and was inducted into the Edmonton Cultural Hall of Fame in October,
2005. In 2008 Fraser was honoured with a D.Litt (Hon) degree by the
University of Alberta.
Career
Highlights
Fraser began his broadcasting career with Foster Hewitt’s radio
station CKFH, Toronto in 1951. He later worked at radio stations in
Timmins and in Barrie, Ontario (where he was the play-by-play voice
of the Barrie Flyers “Junior A” hockey team). In the mid-fifties
he hosted radio programs on CKVL, Verdun and was later a journalist
in the CFCF news department in his home town of Montreal, Quebec.
He moved to Regina in 1958, and worked in public relations in both government
and private sectors before founding and publishing, in 1960, the Regina
Weekly Mirror, which chronicled the introduction of Medicare by the
Tommy Douglas Government. In Regina Fraser hosted the “hot stove
league” between period commentaries for broadcasts of the Saskatchewan
Junior Hockey League sponsored by the Saskatchewan Government Insurance
Office as well as hosting a week-end news round-up for CJME. Between
1963 and 1969, Fraser was a writer/editor and health educator in the
field of alcoholism and addictions. He was the Director of Education
at the Saskatchewan Bureau on Alcoholism, and in 1965, he moved to Edmonton
to work in the same capacity with the Division of Alcoholism of the
Alberta Department of Health (now AADAC).
In
1969, he joined the Metropolitan Edmonton Educational Television Association
(MEETA), forerunner of Alberta's ACCESS TV NETWORK, as program director
of Canada's first on air educational television station, which became
available to Edmonton viewers in March, 1970. He was the "co-anchor"
for CBC Edmonton's supper hour news and public affairs program in 71/72
and 72/73, and the host of ITV Television’s Fil Fraser Show in
1974. During the same period, he formed his own production company and
wrote, produced and directed several educational films for television.
In
1976 he produced one of Canada's most successful feature films, WHY
SHOOT THE TEACHER, following with MARIE ANNE in 1977 and THE HOUNDS
OF NOTRE DAME in 1980. All were award winners, receiving both theatrical
and television release.
In 1974, Fraser organized and chaired the first Alberta Film Festival,
now known as the AMPIA Awards, in which his films were later to win
several prizes. He chaired the first Commonwealth Games Film Festival
in 1978, and, in 1979, was a founder of the Banff International Television
Festival.
Between 1989 and 1992, Fraser served a three-year term as Chief Commissioner
of the Alberta Human Rights Commission. He was President and Chief Executive
Officer of VISION TV from January 1995 to December 2000.
Fil
Fraser was born and educated in Montreal, and has been happily married
to Gladys Odegard for twenty five years.
Public Service
Fraser was a member of the 1977 Alberta Task Force on Film, which recommended
the establishment of the Alberta Motion Picture Development Corporation.
In 1985 federal Communications Minister Marcel Masse appointed him as
a member of the Federal Task Force on Broadcasting Policy (Caplan/Sauvageau),
whose September, 1986 report formed the basis for a new Canadian Broadcasting
Act. He was appointed in August 1987, to the Canadian Multiculturalism
Council by the then Secretary of State, the Honourable David Crombie,
and was Chair of the Council's media committee. On behalf of the Minister
of State for Multiculturalism, the Honourable Gerry Weiner, Fraser organized
and chaired a National Forum on Broadcasting and Multiculturalism, “Reflections
in the Electronic Mirror”, held in Toronto in May, 1988. In 1990,
Fraser was appointed to membership on “The Citizens’ Forum
on Canada’s Future, a Federal Royal Commission also known as the
“Spicer” Commission.
In 1994, at the request of Mayor of Edmonton, he chaired a Task Force
on Access to Information, which provided the basis for a modern access
to information by-law for the City of Edmonton.
Writing
Fraser is the author of Alberta’s Camelot: Culture and the Arts
in the Lougheed Years, published by Lone Pine Publishing and Running
Uphill – the Fast, Short Life of Canadian Champion Harry Jerome,
a biography of the Olympic sprinter.He
has published numerous articles and stories in newspapers, magazines
and journals. He contributed an essay to the book, “Farewell to
the 70s”, published by Nelson in 1979, and to a 2005 book, “Alberta
– A State of Mind”, published by Key Porter Books in celebration
of the 100th anniversary of the Province of Alberta. His memoir on Canadian
multiculturalism, Black Like Me, appeared in the 100th Anniversary issue
of Saturday Night Magazine in January 1987. His columns on human rights,
multiculturalism, and a broad variety of other subjects have appeared
in the Toronto Star, the Edmonton Journal, the Ottawa Citizen, the Montreal
Gazette and a number of other Canadian dailies.
Teaching
Fraser has taught extension courses on subjects ranging from “Great
Religions” and “Great Civilizations” to “Man
and Chemical Comforts” at the Regina campus of the University
of Saskatchewan, and at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. In 1992
he developed and, up until the time he took up his duties at Vision
TV in 1995, taught a credit course on “The Evolution of Human
Rights” for 3rd year students in the Faculty of Law at the University
of Alberta. He has developed and teaches a graduate course on Canadian
film for Athabasca University, where he is an adjunct professor.
Corporate
Boards:
Current
Milestone Radio, Inc., Toronto - Director
Past
Telefilm Canada – Director, Vice Chair
Radio Nord Communications, Inc., Montreal, Director
CBC Newsworld, Ottawa, Director
Videotron West, Edmonton, Director
Not
for Profit Boards:
Current
Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Arts Awards Foundation, Director, (founding
Chair)
Banff International Television Festival - Honourary Lifetime Director
Canadian Journalism Foundation - Govenor
Past
Edmonton Symphony Orchestra Society, Director
Canadian Broadcast Museum Foundation, Toronto – Director
Banff International Films for Television Festival – Founding Chair
Media Awareness Network, Ottawa - Chair
Canadian Speciality and Premium Television Association (SPTV) –
Founding Chair
Vision TV Foundation, Toronto - Director
North American Association of Broadcasters - Advisory Board
John Humphrey Centre for Peace and Human Rights, Edmonton – Director,
Vice Chair
The University of Alberta – Senator
Ontario Heritage Foundation - Director
Empire Club, Toronto - Director
Edmonton International Film Festival - Director
The Banff Centre - Governor
The Alberta Performing Arts Foundation - Director
Alberta Motion Picture Association – Director
Major Juries:
Member Rose D’Or Television Awards – Montreux, Switzerland
- 1995
President Golden Stag Music Festival, Brasov, Romania – 1996,
Chair Alberta Motion Picture Industries (AMPIA) Awards - 2001
President Banff International Television Festival – 2002, 2005
Chair Canadian Race Relations Foundation Award of Excellence –
2003
Awards
and Honours:
1978 - The Alberta Achievement Award, “in Recognition of Excellence
in Film Making”, presented by Premier Peter Lougheed.
1981 – “Inspiration”, an original sculpture by Roy
Leadbeater; a special award “Presented to Fil Fraser for his dedication
as founder of the Banff Television Festival” by the Banff Television
Foundation.
1989 – The Harambee Award presented for public service by the
Harambee Foundation of Canada.
1990 - The Dave Billington Award, "For his outstanding contribution
to the Alberta Motion Picture Industry", presented by the Alberta
Motion Picture Industries Association (AMPIA)
1991 - Inducted as a member of the Order of Canada by His Excellency,
Hon. Ramon Hnatyshyn, Governor General of Canada.
1994 - Proclaimed Honorary Ambassador of the City of Edmonton by Mayor
Jan Reimer.
1995 - The John Ware Memorial Award for Lifetime Achievement, presented
by the Black Achievement Award Society of Alberta.
1999 - The Harry Jerome Award, “For Excellence in the Professions”,
presented by the Black Business and Professional Association, Toronto.
2001 – “The Fil Fraser Lecture Series”, presented
annually by The Canadian Association of Black Journalists. The series
was created to focus on the important role that cultural and social
diversity can and should play in the Canadian media. Fraser delivered
the inaugural lecture on September 16, 2001.
2005 - Inducted into the Edmonton Cultural Hall of Fame.
2005 – The Alberta Centennial Medal
2008 – Honorary Degree, D.Litt, University of Alberta.