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Globe reporter Peter Mosher went on to serve as press officer for Ontario premier Bob Rae
2021-08-09 00:00:00.0     环球邮报-加拿大     原网页

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       Peter Mosher and his sons.

       Fred Langan

       Peter Mosher, who died on July 12, six weeks shy of his 80th birthday, worked in remote mining sites as a chemist, covered science, religion and politics as a reporter for The Globe and Mail, then was the press officer for Bob Rae during the years when Mr. Rae was an opposition politician in Ontario and later the province’s first NDP premier.

       Perhaps his most important job, however, was when Mr. Mosher became a father in his 40s, after marrying late in life, and retired to take care of his children while his wife worked.

       Peter Barrie Mosher was born in Halifax on Aug. 28, 1941. His mother, the former Phyllis Gormley, was a homemaker, and his father, Roy Milton Mosher, was a sea captain and naval officer. When Peter was born, early in the Second World War, his father was at sea in the North Atlantic as commander of HMCS Barrie, a Flower Class Corvette named after the city in Ontario.

       There was an arrangement to send a coded message to the ship after the birth to let Lieutenant-Commander Mosher know if his newborn child was a boy or a girl. “Peter, Peter Pumpkin Eater” was the message, signalling it was a boy. The name of vessel, Barrie, was chosen as the boy’s middle name.

       After the war, the family moved to Saint John, N.B., where Roy Mosher worked as a commercial sea captain. When sailing a tugboat from Sydney, N.S., to Saint John in April of 1957, the ship was lost at sea with all five aboard.

       “Losing his father was one of the great sadnesses of Peter’s life,” his wife, Marilyn Roycroft, said.

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       Globe subway ad featuring Peter Mosher, a writer for the Globe.

       Fred Langan/Handout

       Mr. Mosher went to McGill University, in Montreal, and graduated with a science degree specializing in chemistry. He then worked for a decade for various mining camps from the Northwest Territories to Haida Gwaii, analyzing core samples on-site. Mr. Mosher worked at many remote sites and loved to buy an old car, drive it across Canada and then sell it when he arrived. While he was working, he heard the news that his mother, who had moved to Alexandria, Ont., where she was working for a small newspaper, was killed by a hit and run driver in 1968.

       It was around that time that he decided to switch careers. His friends told him that because he read so much and wrote well, he should try his hand at journalism. Mr. Mosher enrolled in the one-year journalism program at Carleton University and, even before he finished his degree started work at The Globe and Mail.

       A man with curiosity about everything, he wrote about science, religion and politics and ended up in The Globe’s Queen’s Park Bureau, where he shared a crowded space with Norman Webster, who was the bureau chief at the time and later became the paper’s editor-in-chief.

       Mr. Mosher often worked late, covering the night sessions at the legislature. Looking down from the gallery, he could see the early edition of The Globe and Mail delivered to members in their seats. They would read the story Mr. Mosher had filed earlier that day, look up to the gallery and acknowledge him.

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       In the early 1980s, Mr. Mosher began working with Mr. Rae, who left federal politics to run for the leadership of Ontario’s NDP. Since the party was short on funds, it helped that Mr. Mosher liked to drive.

       “In the early days when we [the provincial NDP] were in third place, we travelled all over the province together and he was a wonderful companion, very bright and very well-read and had a tremendous sense of humour,” said Mr. Rae from New York, where he is now Canada’s representative at the United Nations. “Peter was very interested in politics but even more interested in people and human nature and assessing people’s character and what they might do.”

       It might sound like serious political business, but Mr. Rae and Mr. Mosher shared the same sense of humour. According to his son Max Mosher, the pair were known on the road as Statler and Waldorf, after two characters on The Muppet Show who made sly quips from their balcony seats.

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       Peter Mosher and Bob Rae in 1994.

       Fred Langan

       There was a romantic angle to Mr. Mosher’s entry into politics. He met his future wife, Ms. Roycroft, when she was managing Mr. Rae’s run for the leadership of the provincial NDP.

       Mr. Mosher worked with Mr. Rae from 1981 to 1987, then returned to work as his press secretary and adviser when the NDP surprised the political world by winning a majority in Ontario’s election in April, 1990.

       “I am really glad to have had someone like Peter working so closely with me; he was a wonderful friend as well as a great counsellor, just a great guy,” Mr. Rae said.

       In 1995 Peter Mosher retired from politics and writing and stayed at home with his two sons, Max and Tom. He took his children to the park and the zoo, walked them to and from school and entertained their friends at home. Because he was older, many people thought he was the boys’ grandfather. That didn’t bother him.

       His wife remembers one particular family trip.

       “We were fortunate to have many travel adventures together as a couple and a family, once taking two young children and 17 pieces of luggage on a trip to Europe, where we travelled to about four or five countries. Our travels with old-fashioned, foldable Michelin maps on the roads of Europe led to many a family joke,” Ms. Roycroft said.

       Mr. Mosher had a huge library, almost all of it non-fiction. He also was addicted to watching old movies, a pastime he picked up from his mother, and had a collection of old tapes. He was interested in history, in particular the Second World War, not surprising given his father’s naval service and his unusual middle name.

       Mr. Mosher leaves his wife, Ms. Roycroft; their sons, Max and Tom; and his brothers, Tom and Ken.

       


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关键词: politics     Peter Mosher     Bob Rae     Roycroft     Globe     Barrie     gallery    
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