EDITOR'S NOTE: Please see the correction at the bottom of this story.
The quiet printer who owned Grand Valley Press in Moose Jaw from 1960 until the 1980s experienced an interesting life as publisher of weekly newspapers in this province.
A visitor to his cramped office at Grand Valley Press learned about one of Jim Losie’s ventures when he remarked that one of the Moose Jaw City councillors came from Sturgis, a town northwest of Yorkton.
“Sturgis, the Communist Capital of Saskatchewan!” fumed Losie.
“What do you mean Communist Capital of Saskatchewan?” asked the visitor. He knew that northeastern region was known as Red Square in political circles for strong support of the CCF then NDP movements.
“I used to own a newspaper in Sturgis,” said Losie. “I let a Liberal lawyer talk me into writing an editorial about the CCF. That was a mistake.
“The newspaper was set on fire and burned down.”
Politics was indeed a hot issue.
He said the Mounties had suspects but were never able to collect enough evidence to lay a charge. In 1949 when Losie bought the Sturgis newspaper, Saskatchewan politics was a passionate affair.
“After that I stayed away from politics, just ran stories about music festivals, stuff like that.”
Losie had just bought the North East Review when the fire in the fall of 1949 destroyed the newspaper building, the Losie residence, a bakery and restaurant.
Losie, his wife and four children were left with the clothes on their back that fiery Sunday.
Losie rebuilt and published again but business never recovered. The newspaper closed in 1952.
According to the Sturgis history, Harvest of Memories, Jim Losie “left his mark on Sturgis.”
A musician with the famed Mart Kenney big band orchestra in the 1930s, he started a community band teaching the parents and children how to play the various instruments and played in a popular dance band called the Black Hornets.
Losie’s first introduction to weekly newspapers was at Tugaske just northwest of Moose Jaw. He left there for Sturgis.
On leaving Sturgis he bought a weekly newspaper in Davidson then in 1960 bought Grand Valley Press. He published six local weeklies at Grand Valley before selling them.
Once car makers switched from running pages and pages of fall car ads in weekly newspapers for television, the weeklies became less viable, he explained.
Losie died in 1982.
Ron Walter can be reached at ronjoy@sasktel.net
CORRECTION:
Our apologies to the family of the late Jim Losie for the inaccuracies reported in an article that appeared recently in our online daily, MooseJawToday.com: "Sturgis described as Communist Capital of Saskatchewan" by Ron Walter. The story did not appear in the Moose Jaw Express weekly.
In speaking with Jim Losie's daughter, Maureen Scott, she wanted to clarify some of the misinformation presented by Ron Walter.
Initially she voiced her dismay at the title of the article wondering why it was used in regard to a story about her father. Maureen said she had never heard her father speak in those terms as 'Sturgis as the Communist Capital of Saskatchewan,' and wondered why now in this day-and-age with all the prejudices throughout the world, someone would use heresy in this manner.
Losie and his wife had six children, not four as was reported. Maureen said, "Jim Losie was my father, a war veteran who fought for his country for six years. There were six children not four; my brother Denis and I were nine and twenty-two months at the time. We were carried out by our older sisters. My two brothers had to jump through flames to save their own lives."
According to her, the Losie family moved to Moose Jaw in 1959. At that time, Gord Hume owned Grand Valley Press in Moose Jaw and had contacted Jim Losie to come work for him. Losie was at the time working as the managing editor at the Davidson Leader newspaper, then owned by Vopni.
In 1962, Jim Losie purchased Grand Valley Press from Hume (according to the Grand Valley Press website).
Losie was better renowned for his band involvement and the passion he had for playing and starting up numerous bands throughout his lifetime, and in the 1930’s “played saxophone and clarinet with the nationally acclaimed Mart Kenney Band”, according to an excerpt from the Sturgis and District History Book.
