Flashback: Ups and downs
An early GoPro-style camera shot is captured during a bungee jump
Taking the plunge
This month, roller-coaster fans stood in line for hours to try AlpenFury, a new ride at an amusement park near Toronto. One of them told CBC Radio's As It Happens he liked the feeling of doing "something death-defying," and this felt safer than stunts like skydiving or bungee jumping.
In 1990, host Knowlton Nash of The National introduced an item about "North America's first legal bungee-jumping centre" in Nanaimo, B.C., and in the report, the CBC's Bob Nixon said he was stupid enough to try the $95 ($199 in 2025) jump.
"Here's my cameraman, Pat Bell — he's also stupid," Nixon said as Bell prepared to take the plunge with a camera strapped to his body. We'd call the resulting pictures proto-GoPro cinematography.
A different angle
"The universe begins for me in Winnipeg," said Matthew Rankin, director of the 2024 movie Universal Language, in a recent CBC Arts piece. "That exerts great existential pressure on my meaningless life, which I think is true of a lot of Winnipeggers."
The feature — on the city's tradition of "off-centre filmmaking" — also mentions filmmakers John Paizs (who was noticed for his 1984 film Crime Wave) and Guy Maddin, who writer Matthew Teklemariam says is "perhaps Winnipeg's most celebrated filmmaker."
In 1991, Maddin (whose latest film at the time was Archangel) told the CBC's Beth Harrington about the city's benefits. "Making films [in Winnipeg] is very easy," he said. "You get lots of money; there's not that much competition; everyone's really helpful; and rent is cheap for equipment and for space."
For the love of cats
Coal, the last survivor of a group of feral felines on Parliament Hill, has died at 17, CBC News reported recently. He had been cared for in a sanctuary until 2013, when it closed and all of the cats were adopted.
Before the colony was dispersed, volunteer René Chartrand prepared meals for the cats and took a bus to visit them daily, according to a 1989 report on CBC's Midday. Reporter Cory O'Kelly said Chartrand spent "a small fortune" on food and welcomed donations.
"René has even built a plywood home for the cats and added insulation," O'Kelly said. "Blankets from his home help the cats survive the bitter cold."
Hail no
Damaging hail the size of golf balls hit the Calgary area last week, and locals shared photos of the aftermath with CBC News. When another form of precipitation — snow — fell on parts of Alberta in 1999, residents took it in stride.
A taste of history
Canada's Jersey Milk chocolate bar, originally made by Neilson, is no more, the Financial Post reported recently. Neilson also marketed the Crispy Crunch bar and even tried selling it in the U.S., as the CBC's Venture reported in 1991.
A summit in space
Last week was the 50th anniversary of a meeting in space between American astronauts and Soviet cosmonauts, the New York Times reported. When the Soviets invited reporters to the cosmonaut training centre in Russia before the 1975 event, Lloyd Robertson was there for the CBC.
Climbing numbers
Last week, the CBC podcast This Is Saskatchewan learned that would-be homebuyers in Regina and Saskatoon are facing bidding wars these days. Low inventory is among the reasons — not a population boom like the one that pushed the province past the one-million mark in 1983.
