Cross Country Checkup

Last updated
Cross Country Checkup
Genre Phone-in
Country of originCanada
Language(s) English
Syndicates CBC Radio
Hosted by Ian Hanomansing
Original releaseMay 16, 1965 (1965-05-16) –
present
Website Cross Country Checkup

Cross Country Checkup is a Canada-wide open-line phone-in talk radio show that airs Sunday afternoons on CBC Radio One. Beginning in 2021, the first hour of the program has also been simulcast on television on CBC News Network.

Contents

The program has been hosted by Ian Hanomansing since September 2020; he was initially announced as an interim host for the 2020–21 season while previous host Duncan McCue was on an eight-month sabbatical, [1] although his time with the program continued into 2022 before he was announced as the permanent host in June of that year. [2]

Every week, the show features a lively discussion on an issue of national interest or importance and invites listeners to call in with their opinions and thoughts. The topics are usually related to Canadian politics. In addition to the host, the show has commentators who are experts or involved in the issue. They are interviewed by the host and answer questions from callers.

The program is broadcast Sundays live at 4 p.m. Eastern Time Zone across the country, unlike most other Radio One programs, which air at the same local time in each time zone. The recording of the live show is rerun in a condensed format on Monday afternoons at 3 p.m. EST as Cross Country in an Hour. On extraordinary news occasions, the show may also produce a special episode outside of its regular broadcast time.

Close to half-a-million listeners tune in every Sunday afternoon to hear a lively exchange of ideas between callers and invited guests, and a broad cross-section of opinion on the topic of the day. On average, 5,000 to 10,000 people attempt to call the program during the broadcast to join the discussion.

The show's current format takes calls on a topic for the first 90 minutes, followed by a half-hour "Ask Me Anything" segment where callers can ask questions of a specific personality in the news.

History

The show was first broadcast on May 16, 1965, [3] when it was started to provide a nationwide forum to discuss the then-proposed national health insurance system now in place in Canada. The first host was CBC Montreal announcer Bob Cadman, and its first guest was Dr Victor Goldbloom, then president of the Canadian Medical Association. When Checkup started broadcasting as a weekly series on November 24, 1965, Jim Schrumm was the first regular host. [4] Subsequent hosts have included Brad Crandall, Moses Znaimer, Percy Saltzman, Betty Shapiro, John Dafoe, Pierre Pascau, Harry Elton, Elizabeth Gray, Wayne Grigsby, Dennis Trudeau, Augusta La Paix, Dale Goldhawk, Peter Downie, Royal Orr and Rex Murphy, who maintained the position for 21 years.

In September 2015, Murphy announced that he would be retiring from the program as of September 20. [5] The program was hosted by a series of guest hosts through the first half of 2016, until McCue's appointment as the new permanent host was announced in July. [6]

On occasions in the past, the program has gone to air as Cross-Continent Checkup by involving a radio network in at least one other foreign country, such as National Public Radio in the United States, London Broadcasting Company (as it was then known) in Britain or the CBC's own Radio Canada International, and taking calls from English-speaking callers in all involved countries. In each case, callers generally call a toll-free number in their own country. Checkup, nevertheless, often receives calls from callers outside Canada.

For the 2016–2017 season, the show changed the signature music that opened the programme since at least the early 1970s.

Related Research Articles

Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues and consisting entirely or almost entirely of original spoken word content rather than outside music. They may feature monologues, dialogues between the hosts, interviews with guests, and/or listener participation which may be live conversations between the host and listeners who "call in" or via voice mail. Listener contributions are usually screened by a show's producers to maximize audience interest and, in the case of commercial talk radio, to attract advertisers.

Rex Murphy is a Canadian commentator and author, primarily on Canadian political and social matters. He was the regular host of CBC Radio One's Cross Country Checkup, a nationwide call-in show, for 21 years before stepping down in September 2015. He currently writes for the National Post and has a YouTube channel called RexTV.

CBC News Network is a Canadian English-language specialty news channel owned by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). It broadcasts into over 10 million homes in Canada. As Canada's first all-news channel, it is the world's third-oldest television service of this nature, after CNN in the United States and Sky News in the United Kingdom.

The Current is a Canadian current affairs radio program which airs weekday mornings on CBC Radio One. It airs weekdays starting at 8:37 a.m. local time and runs until 10 a.m., and features interview sessions and radio documentaries that typically take up a half hour each.

<i>Definitely Not the Opera</i> Canadian pop culture radio program and podcast

Definitely Not the Opera was a magazine-style radio program focusing on aspects of pop culture and storytelling, that aired on CBC Radio One on Saturday afternoons from 1994 until 2016. The show's running time varied over the years, though it ran for a full hour in its final year. An abridged version of each program is available for download as a weekly podcast, with an abbreviated sister edition called Your DNTO, airing on Tuesday afternoons and featuring listener-submitted content.

The National is a Canadian national television news program which serves as the flagship broadcast for the English-language news division of CBC News by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. It reports on major Canadian and international news stories, airing on CBC Television stations nationwide Sunday to Friday at 10:00 p.m. local time.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stuart McLean</span> Canadian broadcaster and storyteller

Andrew Stuart McLean, was a Canadian radio broadcaster, humorist, monologist, and author, best known as the host of the CBC Radio program The Vinyl Cafe. Often described as a "story-telling comic" although his stories addressed both humorous and serious themes, he was known for fiction and non-fiction work which celebrated the decency and dignity of ordinary people, through stories which often highlighted the ability of their subjects, whether real or fictional, to persevere with grace and humour through embarrassing or challenging situations.

<i>The Diane Rehm Show</i>

The Diane Rehm Show was a call-in show based in the United States that aired nationally on NPR. In October 2007, The Diane Rehm Show was named to the Audience Research Analysis list of the top ten most powerful national programs in public radio, the only talk show on the list. ACT 1 Systems Inc., using Nielsen audience data, estimated that the program at that time had "1.7 million listeners," a number that was later revised upward to 2.4 million listeners in December 2015. It was produced by WAMU and hosted by Diane Rehm. The show debuted on WAMU in the 1970s as Kaleidoscope, a weekday morning arts and discussion program. Diane took over as host in 1979, and the show became The Diane Rehm Show in 1984. The final broadcast of The Diane Rehm Show was aired on December 23, 2016. As of January 2, 2017, WAMU broadcasts 1A in the same timeslot.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ian Hanomansing</span> Canadian journalist

Ian Harvey Hanomansing is a Trinidadian-Canadian television journalist with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). He formerly hosted CBC News Network Vancouver on CBC News Network, and reports for CBC Television's nightly newscast, The National.

Stations in Canada's CBC Radio One network each produce some local programming in addition to the network schedule.

CFIQ is a commercial radio station licensed to Richmond Hill, Ontario, and serving Greater Toronto, Southern Ontario and Western New York with a talk format known as "640 Toronto". Owned by Corus Entertainment, CFIQ's studios are located at the Corus Quay Building in Toronto; despite the station's city of license being a suburban community north of the city, the transmitter resides in the Niagara Region town of Lincoln, 60 kilometres of Toronto.

The House is a Canadian national politics and current affairs radio program, airing nationally on Saturday mornings on CBC Radio One with repeat broadcasts Saturday nights. The show's contents and format are similar to a television Sunday morning talk show. It is produced from the studios of CBO-FM at the CBC Ottawa Broadcast Centre in Ottawa, Ontario.

The World at Six is the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's flagship dinner-hour radio news program, airing Monday to Friday from 6 to 6:28 p.m. local time on CBC Radio One except in Newfoundland where it begins at 6:30. The program was launched on October 31, 1966.

<i>Off the Hook</i> (radio program)

Off the Hook is a hacker-oriented weekly talk radio program, hosted by Emmanuel Goldstein, which focuses on the societal ramifications of information technology and the laws that regulate how people use them. It airs Wednesday nights at 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time in New York City on the community radio station WBAI 99.5 FM. It is also simulcast online via streaming MP3, rebroadcast on various other radio stations, and has been made available as a podcast.

<i>The Jim Rome Show</i>

The Jim Rome Show is a sports radio talk show hosted by Jim Rome. It airs live for three hours each weekday from 9 a.m. to noon Pacific Time. The show is produced in Los Angeles, syndicated by CBS Sports Radio, and can be heard on affiliate radio stations in the U.S. and Canada. In January 2018, the show began simulcasting on television on CBS Sports Network.

Elizabeth Gray is a Canadian radio broadcaster, who has been a host and documentary producer for CBC Radio.

CBC News Network is the self-named rolling news program on CBC News Network. The show is broadcast weekdays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. ET, Saturdays from 6 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. ET and Sundays from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. ET with additional evening broadcasts on weekdays. On Saturdays additional live editions air at the 6, 9 and 11 p.m. half-hours. Aarti Pole is the main host of these editions.

Dale Goldhawk is a Canadian broadcaster, journalist, and investigative reporter.

<i>Q</i> (radio show) Canadian radio show

q with Tom Power is a Canadian arts magazine show produced by and airing on CBC Radio One, with syndication to public radio stations in the United States through Public Radio Exchange. The program mainly features interviews with prominent cultural and entertainment figures, though subjects and interviewees also deal with broader cultural topics such as their social, political and business aspects, as well as weekly panels on television/film and music on Mondays and Fridays respectively.

Duncan McCue is a Canadian television and radio journalist for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. He is Anishinaabe (Ojibway), from Ontario, a member of the Chippewas of Georgina Island First Nation. A longtime reporter for CBC Television's The National, he was the host of CBC Radio One's radio call-in show Cross Country Checkup from 2016 to 2020, and the first Indigenous person to host a mainstream show at the public broadcaster. He lives in Toronto.

References

  1. ↑ "Ian Hanomansing named interim host of Cross Country Checkup's 55th season". Cross Country Checkup, September 3, 2020.
  2. ↑ David Friend, "CBC makes changes at ‘The National’ ahead of free streaming channel launch". Toronto Star , June 30, 2022.
  3. ↑ "About the Show". CBC Radio.
  4. ↑ Andrew Simon. "History: The Birth of Cross Country Checkup". CBC Radio.
  5. ↑ "Rex Murphy leaving CBC’s Cross Country Checkup". Toronto Star , September 13, 2015.
  6. ↑ "CBC Radio Announces New Host of ‘Cross Country Checkup’" Archived 2016-07-27 at the Wayback Machine . Broadcaster, July 26, 2016.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.