“A REAL AMERICAN “HERO” IS GONE AWAY”
What can you think of when you think of the evening news broadcast, I mean the world news and views?
Most of us in this age bracket were watching a man that was so trustworthy and we all knew that what he said was facts and not just things he made up.
He was there with us when the Apollo landed on the Moon, and we were fascinated, he was there when we cried when we heard that our President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas.
He was always there for us, and now he is gone, at the age of 92, he lived a full life that seen many Presidents came and go, he was with us during the Vietnam conflict, he was there with us during the Democratic Convention in Chicago, where a young reporter was pushed and shoved, that young reporter would come and replace him later in his life, he was Dan Rather.
That was the convention that had people on the outside chanting “The Whole World is watching”, can you remember back that far?
Later that year a musical band called CHICAGO would put that song out on their album that sold millions.
Let’s get to some thing that he said every night when he signed off, he would say “And that’s the way it is”.
This man with the glasses and elderly kind look was none other than the most important news anchor in the broadcast business he was “Walter Cronkite”.
He was a man that we all looked to for honest answers and if Walter said it, it had to be true.
He was even there when this thing called “Watergate” happened and caught the men trying to break into the Democratic Convention and stealing files.
This would later bring down a United States President, and he would later be impeached, he was President Richard M. Nixon.
Nixon was hated by the young, and it was all because he was willing to keep this war in Vietnam going and killing our young innocent men and woman.
Protests around the country raged, and he was looked on as “Tricky Dickey”, and that was not funny.
Walter Cronkite was born November 4, 1916, in St. Joseph, Missouri. He was the son of Helen Lena Fritche and Dr. Walter Leland Cronkite, a Dentist.
Cronkite lived in Kansas City, Missouri until he was ten, when his family moved to Houston, Texas. He attended junior high school at Lanier Junior High School [Now Lanier Middle School) and High school at San Jacinto High School, were he edited the high school newspaper. He was a member of the Boy Scouts. He attended college at the University of Texas at Austin. There he worked on the “Daily Texan”.
He would later drop out of college in his junior year, in 1935, after starting a series of newspaper reporting jobs covering news and sports.
He entered broadcasting as a radio announcer for WKY in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. In 1936, he met his future wife Mary Elizabeth Maxwell (known by her nickname “Betsy”). While working as the sports announcer for KCMQ (AM) in Kansas City, Missouri, his broadcast name was “Walter Wilcox”. He would later explain radio stations did not want people using their real names. This was all due to the fear that if a announcer would leave the station, they did not want their fans following them to another radio station. In Kansas City in 1936 he joined the United Press, and became one of the top reporters in World War 2, covering battles in North Africa and Europe. He was one of eight journalist selected by the United States Army Forces to fly bombing raids over Germany in a B-17 Flying Fortress. He also landed in a glider with the 101st Airborne in Operation Market Garden and he covered the Battle of the Bulge.
After the war he covered the Nuremberg Trials and he served as United Press main reporter in Moscow for two years.
Early years at CBS
In 1950, (the year this writer was born ) Cronkite joined CBS News in its young and growing television division, he was recruited by Edward R. Murrow, who had previously tried to hire Cronkite from UP during the war. Cronkite began working at WTOP-TV the CBS affiliate in Washington D.C. .
He originally served as anchor of the network’s 15 minute late Sunday evening newscast “Up To The Minute” , followed by “What’s My Line” at 11:00 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, from 1951 to 1962.
Then July 7, 1952, the term “anchor” was coined to describe Cronkite’s role at both the Democratic and Republican National Convention, which marked the first nationally televised convention coverage. Cronkite anchored the network’s coverage of the 1952 presidential election as well as later conventions. In 1964 he was temporarily replaced by the team of Robert Trout and Roger Mudd, this proved to be a mistake, and Cronkite returned to the anchor chair for future political conventions.he
From 1953 to 1957, Cronkite hosted the CBS program “You Are There”, which reenacted historical events, using the format of a
News report. His famous last lines for these programs were “What Sort of Day Was It”?
Cronkite was the lead broadcaster of the networks coverage of the 1960 Winter Olympics, the first ever time such and event was televised in the United States. He replaced Jim McKay who had suffered a mental breakdown.
.The CBS Evening News
On April 16, 1962, Cronkite succeeded Douglas Edwards as the anchorman of the CBS Evening News (initially Walter Cronkite with the News), a job in which he became and American Icon.
The program expanded from 15 to 30 minutes on September 2, 1963, making Cronkite the anchor of American network televistions first nightly half-hour news program.
But just as all good things come in time, so must they must pass away.
He continued to be the most trusted news person in America, but he retired in 1981.
One of Walter Cronkites, trademarks was his ending of the CBS Evening News with the phrase “And that’s the way it is”, followed by the date,
Retirement
On February 14, 1980, Cronkite announced that he intended to retire from the CBS Evening News, at the time CBS had a policy of mandatory retirement by age of 65.
He would later go on to decribe himself as “a comfortable old shoe” to his audience. By this he meant they could put their foot in him like nice pair of slipper.
His last day in the anchor chair at the CBS Evening News was on March 6, 1981, he was succeeded the following Monday by Dan Rather.
Cronkite’s farewell statement was this:
“
This is my last broadcast as the anchorman of The CBS Evening News; for me, it's a moment for which I long have planned, but which, nevertheless, comes with some sadness. For almost two decades, after all, we've been meeting like this in the evenings, and I'll miss that. But those who have made anything of this departure, I'm afraid have made too much. This is but a transition, a passing of the baton. A great broadcaster and gentleman,
Doug Edwards, preceded me in this job, and another,
Dan Rather, will follow.
[1] And anyway, the person who sits here is but the most conspicuous member of a superb team of journalists; writers, reporters, editors, producers, and none of that will change. Furthermore, I'm not even going away! I'll be back from time to time with special news reports and documentaries, and, beginning in June, every week, with our science program, Universe.
[8] Old anchormen, you see, don't fade away; they just keep coming back for more. And that's the way it is: Friday, March 6, 1981. I'll be away on assignment, and and
Dan Rather will be sitting in here for the next few years. Good night.
[25I have one thing to add since Walter is no longer with us, if you ever wanted to hear the truth, then CBS News was the place to get it, and Walter Cronkite was the man to have you explain what happened or when.
He was 92 that that is a good age, he had seen wars and seen the worst in Presidents, he also had been with us in our times of trouble, like when the prisoners were being held in Iran, and he was with us during the Apollo space adventures.
Most of us American’s that knew him should say THANK YOU WALTER, for being the best.
Now he is gone, and we now can look back and remember all the great times we had when he was alive and with us.
Thanks
APJR