Rick CluffThe Globe and Mail
Rick Cluff will soon be able to finally hit the snooze button.
Mr. Cluff, the long-time host of CBC Radio's weekday morning show in Vancouver, announced his retirement Monday, ending a 41-year career at the public broadcaster that included two decades as the voice of The Early Edition.
"The time just felt right," said Mr. Cluff.
"My alarm clock has been welded on 3:15 for over 25 years. I had some health issues this summer," he said, referring to heart surgery. "I feel fine now, but I had three months off to see what it was like not to have to worry about getting out of bed the next morning at 3:15. … I want to do something while I've got the energy and this new outlook and new heart."
Mr. Cluff started his career as a sports commentator in Toronto before taking over at The Early Edition in 1997. He remembers being initially hesitant to make the move.
"I laughed and said, 'Right. Eastern sportscaster does Western current affairs, I'll last a minute and a half before they ride my ass out of town,'" Mr. Cluff said, chuckling.
They didn't. Instead, Mr. Cluff quickly become a daily staple for CBC listeners in the Vancouver region. He estimates he's conducted about 50,000 interviews on The Early Edition – in addition to 20,000 before that in sports – while bringing listeners some of the biggest news stories of the past 20 years.
In 2003, one of those stories took him to Prague when the 2010 Winter Olympics were awarded to Vancouver; he remained in the host's chair when the Games took over the city.
He was working the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. Mr. Cluff was getting ready to go on the air when CBC newscaster Cecilia Walters told him to turn on his television. A plane had just flown into the World Trade Center in New York.
Mr. Cluff said he thought of his childhood friend, Brian Clark, at the time of the attack. Mr. Clark worked in the second building that was hit in New York that day.
"I thought I'd seen one of my oldest friends killed in front of my eyes. Brian was actually above the impact and long story short, he is one of four people who made his way down through it and lived, survived," Mr. Cluff said.
He remembers going on air and handing the newscast over to WABC New York.
"I still have people come up to me now, years later to say, you woke me up and told me to turn on my television on 9/11," said Mr. Cluff.
More recently, he said interviews related to the opioid crisis in Vancouver have stuck out for him.
"I believe I've asked every mayor I've ever interviewed, 'How did you let this happen? Why haven't we helped the people?'" Mr. Cluff said.
Mr. Cluff first tried his hand at broadcasting in campus radio at Seneca College in Toronto, and Western University in London, Ont.
"I wrote the LSATs and I was prepared to go into law school and I said 'Nah, the world doesn't need another lawyer,' so I took a year off and sold wound management systems believe it or not," said Mr. Cluff.
"I did that for a year and that's when I decided maybe I should look at journalism, so I went to grad school at Carleton in Ottawa and did the journalism program there and then the CBC recruited me in 1976."
His final day on The Early Edition will be Dec. 22. His successor has yet to be announced.
Theresa Duvall, a producer at the show who has worked with Mr. Cluff for about 16 years, said his influence on the newsroom will be missed.
"He's a mentor when you need him to be a mentor; he's a shoulder to lean on and cry on when you need that as well. He's the person to rally the team and to make us all burst out laughing when we need a good laugh," Ms. Duvall said.
"I laugh every day at work and he's a huge part of that," she said.