Lynch, Charles Burchill, 1919-1994 : Charles Burchill Lynch, newspaperman and commentator, was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, of Canadian parents on 3rd December 1919, and was brought to Canada at the age of two weeks. He grew up and was educated in Saint John, New Brunswick, and started his newspaper career there in 1936.
He worked for newspapers and news agencies in Saint John (New Brunswick), Halifax (Nova Scotia), Vancouver (British Columbia), Montreal (Quebec) and Toronto (Ontario) before joining Reuters News Agency as a war correspondent at the end of 1943. He then served as Reuters correspondent in Berlin, and headed the team of Reuters correspondents.
He remained with Reuters until 1956, on various assignments including that of Chief Correspondent in South America, Chief Correspondent in Canada (1947-1950) and Editor in New York City. In 1956, he became United Nations correspondent for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and appeared on the national TV election coverage in Canada in 1957.
Charles Lynch became Chief of the Ottawa bureau of Southam News in 1958, and was appointed Chief of Southam News in 1960, in charge of national and international news coverage. In addition to his writing, he lectured to Canadian audiences from coast to coast, and was a familiar figure on national radio and television. He served as president of the Parliamentary Press Gallery in 1976, and received an honorary doctorate of laws from Mount Allison University the same year. He was past president of the Canadian War Correspondents Association, and in 1981 he was named to the Canadian News Hall of Fame. In December 1984, he retired from Southam News and continued to free-lance.
His writings from abroad won him the Bowater Award and the National Newspaper Award. In 1965, he published his first book, "China, One Fourth of the World", based on his dispatches during the course of a two-month tour of the People's Republic of China. In 1977, he was appointed an Officer of the Order of Canada. In 1983, his first volume of memoirs, "You Can't Print That!", appeared later followed by a second volume, "A Funny Way to Run a Country", in 1988. He published a number of other books based upon his observations of Canadian political life including "Race for the Rose" (1984), "The Lynch Mob" (1988) and "Fishing With Simon" (1991).
In a lighter vein, Charles Lynch was also a musician of note and appeared as guest harmonica soloist with various bands and symphony orchestras. He called himself "the last of the sporting house harmonica players".
