Last summer, on Friday, July 13, the staff of Chatelaine assembled in the glass-walled boardroom on the eighth floor of the Rogers building on Mount Pleasant. The meeting had been called by the maga­zine’s publisher, Kerry Mitchell, but no one knew quite what to expect. The past few years had been difficult for the editorial crew, and on this overcast morning they were wary and beleaguered.

Mitchell sat at the head of the table and announced that, effective immediately, editor-in-chief Sara Angel was “no longer working with us at Chatelaine.” No explanation was offered. The rest of Mitchell’s speech stuck to the future. Nothing had changed (although, in fact, everyone in the room knew very much had), there would be no other personnel realignments, and everyone should continue on course, putting out a very good magazine that’s getting better and better. The company’s support was behind Chat­elaine, she continued, and Lise Ravary, Rogers’ editorial director of women’s titles and new magazine brands, who was sitting beside her, would help out until a new editor could be found.

Make that another new editor, since Chatelaine had burned through two in three years, not to mention dozens of staff members. Canada’s largest magazine by revenue ($56.3 million in 2006) and second largest by circulation (only Reader’s Digest is larger), Chatelaine is one of two flagships in the Rogers empire (Maclean’s is the other), and for much of its 80-year history it has had a reputation for being a pretty stable place. Sometimes staid, not exactly setting journalism on fire, but steadily, predictably delivering what its loyal readers wanted.

Ever since Rona Maynard stepped down as editor-in-chief in 2004, things inside Chatelaine had been anything but pre­dictable, the mood in the office pitched somewhere between anxious and neurotic. The publication that provided tips to women about how to make the best of themselves and their families had itself become dysfunctional.

Like a bad marriage, the Chatelaine story is messy and convoluted—an unhappy tale of miscommunication and naiveté. It features personality clashes between a wilful, controlling publisher and two editors: one a veteran who wouldn’t tolerate interference, the other a headstrong and high-strung talent who had never edited a magazine before. Most sadly, it features a slew of victims—staffers trying to do the best job they could in an increasingly untenable situation—and a corporation that tolerated, or ignored, the turmoil for a surprisingly long time.

The Chatelaine was founded in 1928 (“The” was dropped two years later) as the first Cana­dian general interest, mass-market magazine aimed at women. From the beginning, the mix of articles included a few that dealt with social issues along with a great many providing a service to women—helpful stories about food preparation, clothes, home decor, budgeting and health. The focus stayed the same for decades, with a different emphasis depending upon the era. In the post-war ’50s, content was geared to young parents raising children; from the ’60s to mid-’70s, editor Doris Anderson transformed it into a progressive voice for women’s rights and social justice (even today, this is the period most admired by young journalists attracted to Chatelaine); through the ’80s and early ’90s, under Mildred Istona, it struck a more benign but profitable middle ground—heavy on quick-and-easy recipes with a pinch of reporting and commentary.

"She could be supportive and even likable, but it's like something was out of control just beneath the surface"

Maynard, one of Chatelaine’s long-time writers and editors, succeeded Istona in 1994. Sensing that the concerns of women were shifting, she described the magazine as “the biggest kitchen table in Canada,” a monthly conversation among women across the country. Along with edgy feature writing (environmental illnesses, single mothers on welfare, lesbians in the workplace), she increased health and “personal growth” coverage at a time when interest in these areas was rising among Chatelaine’s readers.

Just as both Istona and Maynard had worked in the trenches at Chatelaine before assuming the editor’s role, Maynard’s successor—hand-picked by her and then-publisher Donna Clark—came from within. Kim Pittaway, managing editor at the time of her appointment, was a respected journalist who had contributed to the magazine for 11 years (her “Broad Side” column was a favourite with readers). It looked like it would be a smooth changing of the guard.