Millions of Canadians got their news from Front Page Challenge

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The Goliath of quiz shows, Front Page Challenge was a stalwart of the small screen across five decades.

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Not bad for the equivalent of a summer intern.

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Debuting on June 24, 1957, Front Page Challenge was only supposed to replace The Denny Vaughan Show for 13 weeks, but the aging variety production was cancelled that year as viewership dwindled.

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In its place, the brainchild of John Aylesworth and Harvey Hart would see an epochally consistent panel try to identify a mystery guest linked to a major news story that would be outlined at the outset.

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For years historian and author Pierre Berton, journalist Gordon Sinclair and actress Toby Robins were challenged by celebrity newsmakers from Canada and around the world, including Martin Luther King Jr., Indira Gandhi, Eleanor Roosevelt and Mary Pickford.

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Six prime ministers and many premiers also appeared throughout the years. 

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The whole circus was led by Fred Davis, who replaced the show’s maiden moderator, Win Barron, who reportedly wasn’t comfortable in the role.

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Alex Barris, who also served as an early guest host and panellist, would settle in as the writer for the duration of the show’s run.

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The panellists were a near-instant hit. They developed a reputation for “intelligence and unedited spontaneity,” according to The Canadian Encyclopedia, and became national celebrities.

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Robins was replaced by journalist Betty Kennedy in 1962, while journalist Allan Fotheringham joined after the death of Sinclair in 1984.

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The relative stability of the panel may have been a double-edged sword as the CBC resisted adding younger panellists as the regulars aged.

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The advent of cable news networks, specifically CBC Newsworld in 1989, is also credited with helping ease Front Page Challenge, which relied on voiced-over newsreels, into antiquity, as audiences gravitated to the more contemporary presentation of current events.

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The final five years of Front Page Challenge averaged 550,00 viewers, down from two million in 1978. 

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