A Canadian Surreal Experience At Hugh Hefner’s Playboy Mansion

© FACEBOOK Julie McLeod of Oakville looks back fondly about her time at the Playboy mansion in the 1980s in the wake of Hugh Hefner's death

Since news broke that Hugh Hefner, founder and editor of Playboy magazine, died Wednesday night at the age of 91 fans called him a “cultural icon,” and “media titan,” while critics hesitated to mourn a man they said embodied “male entitlement.”

Oakville resident Julie McLeod remembers him another way: as a kind, gracious host.

Hefner was well-known as a radical hedonist who played a major role in bringing sex into the mainstream of American media — a legacy that’s brought him both praise and derision.

McLeod, a former model and actress, was living in a hotel in Los Angeles in 1984 when her friend and fellow model Carrie Leigh — then Hefner’s girlfriend — invited her to stay at his famed home instead.

“I was a young woman so I was apprehensive,” McLeod told the Star on Thursday, nodding to the controversy surrounding Hefner that he made his living largely off women’s sexuality.

“There are a lot of people that will presume I must have been a playmate and it must have been wild. That was contrary to my experience.”

Trade War: US slaps 220 percent duty on Canada's Bombardier jets

The Bombardier CS 300 performs its demonstration flight during the Paris Air Show, at Le Bourget airport, north of Paris, June 15, 2015

The U.S. Commerce Department on Tuesday slapped preliminary anti-subsidy duties on Bombardier Inc’s CSeries jets after rival Boeing Co accused Canada of unfairly subsidizing the aircraft, a move likely to strain trade relations between the neighbors.

The department said it imposed a steep 219.63 percent countervailing duty on Bombardier’s new commercial jets after it made a preliminary finding of subsidization. Boeing has complained the 110-to-130 seat aircraft were dumped below cost in the U.S. market last year while benefiting from unfair subsidies.

An April 2016 order for 75 CSeries jets from Delta Air Lines stemmed from the same harmful sales practices European rival Airbus SE employed to win business in the 1990s, according to Boeing.

The Commerce Department’s penalty against Bombardier will only take effect if the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) rules in Boeing’s favor in a final decision expected in 2018.