S.O.S. For Craig Huckerby

Craig Huckerby has been a Sault boy since his family moved here from England when he was three. While a student at Sir James Dunn Collegiate and Vocational School, he volunteered to work for the Huron Broadcasting Company’s local community channel, Lake Superior Cable, in 1979. In 1980, Craig accepted a part-time job as the channel’s playback operator and in 1981, Huron hired him to work full-time at CJIC and CHBX TV as a telecine operator. Promoted to master controller in 1982, Craig began directing weekend television news, becoming a full-time director of news and tv talk shows and as creative services director, winning several awards for his productions of television commercials. Craig’s direction of local election coverage, telethons and parades culminated in a national CanPro Award for Outstanding Direction of a Live Performance Show for his coverage of the Ontario Winter Carnival Bon Soo Pageant in1991.

In 1999, the Broadcast Bureau of Measurements (rebranded “Numeris”) reported an 11% increase in viewers when Craig, by then senior producer of the local newscast, enhanced its format and production values. And in talks with then news director, Tony Ryma in 2000, Craig’s improvements to weather presentation resulted in his appearance and ultimate adoption of the role of “the weather guy,” all the while continuing his direction of the nightly 6 p.m. show.

When CTV regionalized news production in 2001, operations moved to Sudbury, resulting in 12 local layoffs, Craig included. Together with family members and colleagues, Craig began to investigate new endeavours in local media and in 2002, they launched the first local video news in Canada, LTVNEWS.COM, trailblazing before YouTube and Facebook and also producing a local newscast for the Shaw TV Community channel.

As a result of a regrettably scandalous internal theft that bankrupted the company, LTVNEWS closed in 2005. But various investors encouraged Craig to continue with the launch of SOONEWS.CA in 2006, where he gained a reputation for his fair and balanced reporting and for tackling stories too controversial for the legacy media. He broke an investigative report on Philip Garforth and the Borealis Tourist Attraction for the Gateway Project and elevated awareness of animal welfare. In 2011, SOONEWS.CA became LOCAL2.CA

Since 2005, Craig has been instrumental in the launch of several sites and in addition to LTVNEWS, SOONEWS.CA, LOCAL2.CA, he launched SAULTONLINE.COM in 2014, once again breaking big stories, including the Elliot Lake Mall collapse and the Nipigon Bridge collapse, resulting in record-breaking readerships for the website.

In 2018, SAULT ONLINE launched ONNTV, returning authentic local television to the city, streaming news to TV’s and phones, focusing on local news, election coverage, townhall meetings, parades and myriad local events.

In 2019, Craig was hired by Toronto-based production company I COGITATE to direct the feature-length documentary, “Was I Next? The Sean Cribbin Story,” focusing on the only surviving victim of the notorious serial killer, Bruce McArthur. The film won 134 awards internationally, including Outstanding Documentary, Best Director, Cinematography, Editing and Best Trailer among citations from the USA, India, Britain and France.

In 2020, despite climbing ONNTV viewership, Covid caused major financial losses to the station and it was closed. SAULTONLINE shut down in 2023 but American-based Sovereign Communications hired SAULTONLINE staff to operate FIRSTLOCAL NEWS.COM.

In August, 2024, Sovereign discontinued operation of FIRSTLOCAL NEWS and with it, Craig’s creative life, ending a career spanning 43 years of work with some of the best of the best in local news and media production.

Craig now faces challenging health issues and financial difficulties, due to unemployment