Jump to content

Alphonse Ouimet

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by YUL89YYZ (talk | contribs) at 19:22, 1 June 2005 (Add Order of Canada article). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)

J. Alphonse Ouimet (1908December 20, 1988) was a Canadian television pioneer and president of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) from 1958 to 1967.

Born in Montreal, he received a degree in electrical engineering from McGill University in 1932. In 1932, he helped design, build and demonstrate the first Canadian television set. In 1934, he joined the Canadian Radio Broadcasting Commission, which became the CBC, and was responsible for setting up and running CBC's national radio service. He was involved in launching television broadcasting on the CBC.

After retiring from the CBC, he became, in 1969, chairman of Telesat Canada, which built and launched many of Canada's communications satellites. He retired in 1980.

In 1968, he was made a Companion of the Order of Canada.