Fonds F0556 - Theresa Burke fonds

Title and statement of responsibility area

Title proper

Theresa Burke fonds

General material designation

  • Textual record
  • Graphic material
  • Sound recording
  • Moving images

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Level of description

Fonds

Reference code

F0556

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Issuing jurisdiction and denomination (philatelic)

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Physical description area

Physical description

16 m of textual records and other material

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Archival description area

Name of creator

Biographical history

Theresa Burke is a Canadian producer, director, researcher and writer best known for her work for the Canadian Broadcasting Company (CBC) television program "The fifth estate.” Burke attended the University of Nantes, the University of Ottawa and the University of Alaska before obtaining an Honours BA in Philosophy from the University of Toronto. She worked as a director of public relations and corporate communications at Alliance Entertainment and as a director of marketing for Norstar Entertainment between 1987 and 1990. In 1994, Burke joined "The fifth estate" as a researcher and subsequently became one of the program's producers and directors. She has produced a wide variety of documentary programming for "The fifth estate", with a particular focus on prisoners and miscarriages of justice. Burke was a research associate for Julian Shur's book about Steven Truscott, "Until you are dead: Steven Truscott's long ride into history" (2001), which won the 2002 CAA Birks Family Foundation Award for Biography, and co-wrote "Who killed Ty Conn" (2001) with Linden MacIntyre. "His word against history," a "Fifth estate" documentary about Steven Truscott on which Burke worked extensively as a researcher and producer, was awarded the best investigative report of 2000 by the Canadian Association of Journalists.

Custodial history

Scope and content

Fonds consists of records created and accumulated in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s by Theresa Burke. These records document Burke's research, production and investigative work for "The fifth estate" documentaries airing from 1994 to 2015. Many of these records pertain to the following documentaries: "The trouble with Evan" (1994), "His word against history" (2000), "Terror" (2001), "Nightmare drug" (2002), "A state of denial : the Bill Sampson story" (2002), "Deathrow.com" (2003), "Death of a beauty queen" (2004), "The big break" (2005), "The Steven Truscott story: moment of truth" (2005), "You be the judge" (2005), "The lady vanishes" (2007), "The girl in Saskatoon" (2008), "Someone got away with murder" (2009), "Broken heroes" (2009), "The legacy of Brendan Burke" (2010), “Behind the wall” (2010), "The devil you know" (2011), "A question of innocence" (2011), "Diagnosis murder" (2012), “The last great escape” (2013), “The interrogation room” (2014), and “Mr. Big stings: cops, criminals and confessions” (2015) . Also included are research materials and manuscripts pertaining to Julian Sher's book, "Until you are dead: Steven Truscott's long ride into history" (2001), on which Burke worked as a research associate, as well as manuscripts and other materials relating to Ty Conn and Burke's book, "Who killed Ty Conn" (2000), co-authored with Linden MacIntyre. Records created and accumulated by Burke in the course of her research about the National Parole Board, the subject of witness protection, and the murder conviction of Mason Jenkins are also part of the fonds, as are a number of files relating to other miscellaneous research projects. Records pertaining to Burke's early career in public relations and marketing at Alliance Entertainment and Norstar Entertainment are included in this fonds, as are administrative records and training materials from the CBC, as well as Burke's personal journals, notebooks, letters and university essays. Records in this fonds are predominantly textual records and audiovisual materials arranged by project. These records include correspondence, interview transcripts, memoranda, copies of court transcripts and documents, copies of medical reports, journal articles, notes and notebooks, production materials including draft scripts, newspaper articles, contact lists, copies of police reports, prisoner records and legal documents, video cassettes (in multiple formats), audio cassettes, as well as computer disks and photographs.

Notes area

Physical condition

Immediate source of acquisition

Donated by Theresa Burke in 2009, 2010, 2012, 2019, and 2023.

Arrangement

Language of material

  • English

Script of material

Location of originals

Availability of other formats

Restrictions on access

Access to the records in this fonds is permitted only through a research agreement.

Terms governing use, reproduction, and publication

Finding aids

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Accruals

The fonds comprises the following accessions: 2009-030, 2010-007, 2012-014, 2019-041, 2023-041. Further accruals may be expected.

General note

Many records in this fonds are copies of court documents and other archival records. Dates recorded for these items reflect the date of creation of the original, not the copy.

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Status

Final

Level of detail

Full

Dates of creation, revision and deletion

  • 2010/02/16 J. Grant:. (Creation)
  • 2010/02/16 Awaiting review by the Data Collection Archivist
  • 2010/03/25 J. Grant. Added file and series descriptions for accession 2010-007.
  • 2010/10/27 Dubeau. Add URL for online finding aid.
  • 2012/06/20 J. Grant. Update to include 2012-014 accession.
  • 2012/06/20 J. Grant. Correct font problem in scope and content.
  • 2018/06/26 J. Grant. Post-migration metadata clean-up. Addition of GMD and accession numbers.
  • 2023/11/20 K. Kerr. Update to include 2019-041 accession.
  • 2023/12/19 K. Kerr. Update to include 2023-041 accession.

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