Origins of Le Dynamique de la Mauricie and Positions Held by Lise Léveillé at the Newspaper

Justin Chauvette and Kate Grenier, the two coordinators of this virtual exhibition, speak with Lise Léveillé, a native of the region who acquired ownership of Le Dynamique de la Mauricie in 1978.

Justin – You mentioned that you arrived at the newspaper in April 1965. You were hired as an assistant…. I had written down “administrative assistant” but they were called secretaries at the time. I have three related questions to ask you. How did you meet, you and Mr. Marchand? What led you to accept the position, and how interested were you in journalism at the time?

Lise – So, my uncle happened to live next door to Mr. Marchand and knew he was looking for a secretary. That’s how I found out. I went to meet Mr. Marchand, and I was hired. I had just finished a secretarial course, but I didn’t really want to be a secretary. I didn’t want to be stuck doing accounting, sorting through invoices, that sort of thing. So, when he explained a little about what I’d actually be doing, I was hooked. It turned out he expected me to do a lot of different things. And what was the third question?

Justin – How interested were you in journalism?

Lise – I was never interested in becoming a reporter, if that’s what you mean. But when I did get involved in journalism, it was the learning experience of a lifetime. I learned so much. I was only 16 at the time, so I really didn’t know much about it. But I loved every minute of it. I never regretted being there.

Kate – And before you became the owner, earlier on, what sorts of things were you responsible for?

Lise – Well, I did pretty much everything. There was just [Inaudible] there at the start. He took me to press conferences, explained how to investigate a story, how to structure an article. And within a year, maybe, I wasn’t that bad. I did [Inaudible]. I did layout and writing. I did corrections. I did accounting. I mailed out the newspapers. I did everything. Mr. Marchand took care of the news. But we had correspondents in each community. So, when he died, everything was already in place. The only thing I never liked was selling advertising.

Kate – Why not?

Justin – [Laughter] It’s important.

Lise – It kind of felt like I was begging. In my head, it bothered me. Then, when I became the owner, I thought: “Meh, I don’t know if I’m going to sell ads.” But when I had to, I managed to do it.

Lise’s husband – Anyway, it didn’t show.

Justin and Kate – [Laughter]