Gray, Elizabeth : Elizabeth Gray (1937-2023), journalist and broadcaster, was raised in Toronto. She attended Havergal College and graduated from the University of Toronto with a Bachelor of Arts in English Language and Literature. She is married to journalist John Gray and they have three children. Her career as a print journalist began at the University of Toronto campus paper, The Varsity, under editor Peter Gzowski. After graduating in 1959 she worked for a year as a reporter for the Toronto Telegram. She and her husband then moved to London, England where Gray freelanced for a number of publications including the Toronto Telegram, Weekend Magazine, Maclean's, Star Weekly, Chatelaine, and the Montreal Star where she wrote under the bylines Liz Binks and Elizabeth Binks. While in London Gray became a freelance contributor to CBC radio programs and when the couple returned to Montréal in 1965 she went to work for the CBC as a producer. In 1968 the Grays moved to Ottawa where Elizabeth became host of the local CBC afternoon show NOW...JUST LISTEN!, the first 4-to-6 p.m. talk show on the CBC in Canada. Through the 1970's, Gray continued to write, report, host and comment on various CBC radio programs. She hosted the local morning show CBO MORNING, as well as a weekly talk show with federal politicians called POLITICALLY SPEAKING. During this period she also contributed to the network program CAPITAL REPORT, and was a frequent guest host of the CBC network program THIS COUNTRY IN THE MORNING, later to become MORNINGSIDE. In 1975 she made a radio documentary on the Supreme Court of Canada for the network program CBC TUESDAY NIGHT which earned her an ACTRA Award. FROM 1976 to 1978 she hosted the national call-in program CROSS-COUNTRY CHECK-UP, contributed weekly radio essays called SHADES OF GRAY to MORNINGSIDE, and hosted OLYMPIC MAGAZINE during the summer of 1976 in Montréal. In 1978 she covered the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications (CTRC) hearings to renew the license of the CBC. IN 1977 she hosted SOUNDS DIFFERENT, a series about Third World development. In the private sector in 1979 she also hosted an open-line talk show for CKOY, a private-sector radio station in Ottawa. She was the host of AS IT HAPPENS from 1981 to June 1985, commentator for the network program THE HOUSE and in 1985 she became a documentary maker for the network program SUNDAY MORNING. For television, her work included that of host of LADY IS A FOUR-LETTER WORD, a local CBO Ottawa series, and a frequent guest panelist on CTV's QUESTION PERIOD.
Following her dismissal from AS IT HAPPENS in May of 1985, Gray joined the staff of SUNDAY MORNING in September 1985, at the invitation of Executive Producer Norm Bolan. While there, she made a total of thirty seven documentaries in Canada and abroad until late 1987, travelling to South Africa, India and Uganda in the process. Between 1987 and 1991 she and John Gray lived in London, England where John was employed as Globe and Mail European Bureau Chief. During this period, the Grays also spent a considerable amount of time in Eastern Europe covering the fall of Communism, the Middle East where the Intifadda was beginning, and Northern Ireland. In September 1991, Elizabeth Gray travelled to Russia to join John, one of the very few Canadian correspondents to be in Moscow when Gorbachev was kidnapped. In Moscow until June of 1994, Elizabeth Gray produced over fifty documentaries for SUNDAY MORNING. The couple then returned to Canada where Gray continued to make documentaries for SUNDAY MORNING, later to become THE SUNDAY EDITION, until 2006.Elizabeth Gray passed away on October 25, 2023.
