Can Pro : In the fall of 1972, following a television program session at a Canadian Association of Broadcasters convention in Ottawa, it became apparent that local Canadian TV programming needed more exposure. Thereafter, in the fall of 1973, Harold (Hal) Crittenden, President of CKCK-TV Regina, and Bruce Cowie, General Manager of CKCK-TV, hosted a meeting to discuss the problem and find a solution. This meeting resulted in the formation of CanPro Television Program Festival, a non-profit organization, established with the intent to honour local television program and promotion production through an annual festival supported through entry fees and by broadcasters, the independent sector and sponsors.
The Founders Committee, as the original group came to be known, consisted of Hal Crittenden and Bruce Cowie, CKCK-TV Regina; Bill Elliott, BCTV Vancouver; Wendell Wilks, CFAC-TV Calgary; George Kidd, CFRN-TV Edmonton; Don Brinton, CFQC-TV Saskatoon; Jim Plant, CFPL-TV London; Lee Hambleton, CFCF-TV Montreal; Paul Chamberland, CFCM- TV Quebec City; Fred Sherratt, CHUM Group Toronto; and Ross McCreath, All-Canada Television, Toronto. Their two-day initial meeting provided the platform for the Festival, one that emerged as a definitive venue showcasing the best in Canadian television drama, news shows, documentaries and promotions.
CanPro was held annually for 26 years, beginning in 1974 in Regina, Saskatchewan. Thereafter, the Festival was held alternately in Western and Eastern Canada, in all sizes of markets. It averaged over 300 program and promotion entries per year, with almost 8,000 entries of local Canadian television programming. By 1999 CanPro had grown to the extent that it required full time staff to organize the Festival. At the 1999 Festival, recognizing the developments that had taken place in television broadcasting in Canada over those years - among them the decline in the amount of local TV production, changes in ownership and the advent of many speciality channels, resulting in stations grouping themselves together to plan program production - it became apparent that there was no longer strong support for a CanPro meeting. 1999's CanPro Festival was the final such event. McCreath, Ross. CANPRO: The Canadian Television Program Festival. December 2000. Canadian Communications Foundation. 6 November 2002. . 1344
