Hard-boiled, big-hearted CP journalist John Valorzi dead at 65
TORONTO — John Valorzi, a tough-talking, big-hearted 32-year veteran of The Canadian Press whose boundless enthusiasm, fearsome work ethic and exacting standards helped to shape an entire generation of journalists, has died at the age of 65.
Valorzi — an experienced editor and supervisor whose zeal for his work was matched only by his ambition for instilling similar values, sometimes with a tough-love approach, in those who worked for him, retired in 2012 from a company he adored.
He kept his hand in journalism — most recently as a columnist for the Peel Daily News — but was best known for casting a larger-than-life shadow as a tough but fair boss with an encyclopedic knowledge of history, sports and politics.
Scott White, CP’s former editor-in-chief who worked alongside Valorzi as a political correspondent in both Toronto and Washington, remembered his friend as the hardest-working journalist he’d ever known.