Catherine Ford retired in 2004 from her day job: national columnist for the CanWest chain of newspapers, based at the Calgary Herald.

In her 40-year career as a journalist, Catherine was Associate Editor of the Calgary Herald for eight years and prior to that, the paper's editorial-page columnist. She was in the newspaper business all her working life, joining the Herald as a reporter in 1964. She has worked on newspapers across Canada and has returned to Calgary on three separate occasions.

She was awarded a Southam Fellowship for study at the University of Toronto and subsequently worked for Southam News as the Ontario Correspondent, based in Toronto.

Ford is the winner of ten Western Ontario Newspaper Awards, including the Joan May Trophy for columnists; is a National Media Award winner for the Canadian Association for the Advancement for Women and Sports and holds an International Fire Fighters' media award. She is a frequent television and radio commentator and has written monthly columns for En Route magazine, Calgary Magazine and Apple.

Her non-fiction book, Against The Grain: An Irreverent View of Alberta was published in 2005 to acclaim and a position on the best-seller lists. The book was published in paperback in 2006.

She is a past president of Mensa Canada, a former member of the board of directors of the National Conference of Editorial Writers, and a member of the board of directors for Media Magazine, published by the Canadian Association of Journalists.

In 2005, she was awarded an honourary doctorate from the University of Calgary and continues to teach a course on mass media and Canadian society at the University of Calgary. She is also the recipient of the 2006 Freedom of Expression award and the 2006 Bob Edwards Award. Her latest venture is to be the Ombudsman for the Mount Royal College student newspaper, The Calgary Journal.

Catherine is a member of Mensa Calgary.

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