God's Explorers

A Television Documentary by Susan Cardinal

Susan Cardinal’s various roles as journalist, director, story editor, narrator and teacher highlight an impressive career that started with the CBC’s radio service on British Columbia’s north coast and has taken her around the world to South Korea, South Africa and Cambodia. As a seasoned documentary maker, Susan started probing the controversial history of the Oblate missionaries in 1997. "God’s Explorers" - a two-hour prime-time special for History Television – is the result.

Other Projects

 Susan is the creator and lead writer and director of "The Thirsty Traveler", a 13x30 travel series now into its second production season for the Canadian and American Food Networks. Another Cardinal documentary, "The Snow Eater" - a one hour show on the Chinook wind produced for the Discovery Channel, premiered on Friday January 24 at 9pm ET. It received seven Alberta Motion Picture Industry Association Awards (AMPIA) on April 6, 2003.  It also received two Yorkton Short Film and Video festival nominations in 2003.

 In 1999, Susan received two nominations for On The Edge: The Nature of Risk from the Alberta Motion Picture Industries Association 26^th Annual AMPIA Awards for Best Documentary and Best Female Host.  On The Edge: The Nature of Risk is a co-production with the National Film Board of Canada, broadcast in prime time on the Discovery Channel.

Also in demand as a narrator, Susan performs voice-over for documentary films, primarily wildlife features for the Discovery Channel. She is the narrator for "God’s Explorers".

Before turning to independent television production and forming Westmount Productions Inc. in 1996, Susan enjoyed a distinguished career with the CBC Radio Network. For 20 years she covered major stories producing feature documentaries from across Canada, the United States and from South Africa (1994 All-Race Elections) and from South Korea (1988 Olympics). Her coverage of the Exxon Valdez story (a calamitous oil spill in Alaskan waters) garnered Susan three national journalism awards from the Canadian Petroleum Association (1988-1990). Her landmark radio documentary about a young man dying of AIDS, "Paul’s Story", received numerous accolades and awards nominations in 1987. Susan’s radio documentaries have been aired in Australia and the United States.

As an international training consultant, Susan recently spent a month in Phnom Penh, Cambodia training Khmer journalists (February 2000).  In 1994, she worked in the field with South African journalists covering their first democratic election. While with CBC Radio, Susan trained dozens of staff members in the art of documentary making from Whitehorse to Fredericton. Susan is former board member of Women in Film and Television – Alberta, and the Calgary Institute for the Humanities at the University of Calgary

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God's Explorers premiered on 

History Television Canada 

Wednesday, January 2, 2002

9PM ET/PT 

"I think the Oblates came here with good intentions but the missionary attacked the very soul of the native people."

Fr. Guy Lavallée, omi, Métis priest in "God’s Explorers"

God's Explorers' funding agencies and broadcasters