The 1970s. The year of bell bottoms, afros, beaded vests, free love, urban rise, the birth of hip-hop, the death of bubblegum pop, the birth and death of disco, some of the biggest news stories were scary and weren't around people who's fame didn't reach 14:59, things were much more simpler and TV was achieved (mostly) by antenna.
At the time of the turn of the decade, Americans had 4 choices of national news programs to get their daily stateside and worldwide fix:
the Nightly News with David Brinkley and John Chancellor on NBC
The MacNeil/Leher Report on PBS
(lead by Robert and Jim, respectively)
The Evening News with (the face of national news when it was objective and good) Walter Cronkite on CBS,
and...whatever the hell was on the Alphabet.
Yes, ABC in it's early days wasn't a success across the board. Primetime, daytime and news were in the ratings basement compared to the Eye and the Peacock. (Sometimes, it found better leeway [or got lucky] over NBC and the crap the latter regurgitated at the time.)
So, let's go cliff-notes into the history of ABC News' flagship program.
The Alphabet debuted its daily news program in 1948 and the format was just 15 minutes long. In 1953, the program was hosted by Mr. John Charles Daly, also best known as the host and moderator of What's My Line? on CBS. Daly anchored the program -- named John Daly and the News until 1960,-when he departed, and after multiple fill-ins, was succeeded by for a couple years (starting in 1962) by Ron Cochran, whom himself was replaced by (believe it or not)... Peter Jennings.
Yes, this wasn't the first time Jennings presided over the show. Peter was a transplant from the CBC in Canada, and was hired by ABC to bring a fresher, younger face to keep the show going, with a name change to Peter Jennings with the News. Too bad he was inexperienced at the time, as his (first) tenure didn't last and he departed the program two years later.
It was during that time in 1967 that the network gave the show a major revamp. A new (generic) name, a new format (double the runtime to 30 minutes) and change to color. ABC News was the name of its program from '67 to 1970, with a few hosts at the forefront during that time: Bob Young (67-68), Frank Reynolds (May 68-70; also not the first time as anchor as thought of too) and Howard K. Smith (May 69-70--as co-anchor).
And finally, another name and format change come a new decade. In December 1970, Harry Reasoner left CBS to join ABC to replace Mr. Reynolds as co-anchor of the ABC Evening News (yep, not at all even more generic or lazily conceived) with Mr. K. Smith. Five years later, Smith slid into the role of commentator, leaving Reasoner as sole anchor. That is until 1976 when he received a co-anchor in one (unexpected but incredibly talented) Barbara Walters. Walters joined ABC from NBC's Today on October 4 of that year, and thus begins a storied (and even more turbulent) chapter in ABC News ' history. Reasoner was against Walters not only as his co-anchor, but also against women anchoring any evening news broadcast, as he saw it as a man's job to report short recaps of the day's news. And this wasn't something that he kept to himself or something I made up because of a dislike of him; he really made it known as time went on -- to producers, the viewers (well, at least those who could read his face and body language) and even to Walters. Because of this, the pairing failed to catch on with viewers and Reasoner left ABC after 8 years (up to this point, the longest tenure of an ABC News program host after Charles Daly, sadly) to go back to CBS. But, the best was still yet to come.
Despite its low viewership, constant host and format changes, and constant tension behind the scenes between the previous man-and-woman anchors, the producers and ABC News President Roone Arledge decided to completely revamp the nightly program's approach to presenting the day's main news, and bring Americans a new voice in evening news to get them informed every night at 6:30. So they brought in three new voices (from three different cities to catch up three different angles gathering to move the country closer to the world) and renamed the network's news half-hour to a name and brand that would (and did) change the landscape of the national news program forever.
World News Tonight.
Anchored by three of the best, brightest and most brilliant faces of news at the time, World News Tonight brought viewers the day's national, international, political and world affairs news along with special reports and commentary, all in less than thirty minutes. Anchored by newcomer (and the first black anchor of a network news program) Max Robinson in Chicago, (the returning [and much more experienced]) Peter Jennings in London and (the re-promoted) Frank Reynolds in Washington; along with Special Reports by holdover Barbara Walters and Commentary by Howard K. Smith, this broadcast did just that and brought itself the viewers it deserved and the respect and credibility it really deserved. If you want proof, here's its debut broadcast on this day, July 10, 1978.
During it's first broadcast, featured reports included:
-- International Desk Reports by Jennings
-- Jewish immigrant reporters on trial in Moscow for giving their honest opinions about relations between the United States and the Soviet Union (by Charles Bierbauer)
-- The White House's brutal response to the trial and a drop in Jewish immigration to Russia (by Sam Donaldson)
-- Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin's reaching out to President Jimmy Carter for a helping hand in freeing the jailed reporters (by Bill Siemmens[?])
-- The wife of one of the jailed reporters speaks out to correspondent Jack Smith (introduction by Jennings)
-- Barbara Walters' special report with then-Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz on his unsuccessful defense of the jailed reporters and the impact of their case (he calls it "a farce"). (Introduction by Reynolds)
-- Washington Desk reports by Reynolds
- Congress Returns from recess in hopes of a tax break, an energy bill and a controversial decision on abortion (by Reynolds)
- Firestone tire recall (by Bettina Gregory
- President Carter proposes spending on communities to fight crime
-- National Desk reports (Chicago) by Robinson
- Cleveland public housing police force problems
- Petition for Tax Hike from Proposition 13 in Michigan going to impasse
-Four held hostage by bomb-wielding worker at World Trade Center (by Lynn Shure)
-Little on trial for prison guard murder and escape, delay denied in Raleigh, NC
-Western States farmers vs. crops eating grasshoppers
I thought this first broadcast was a fantastic and well-done production. Everyone was at the top of their game. Reynolds was always a brilliant, consummate professional, Robinson took a huge risk of co-anchoring a national newscast and paid it off handsomely (and damn sure rocks that afro with class) and Jennings proved after a decade of honing his craft as a correspondent for the network and the CBC in his native Canada, he can (and did [AND does]) become a brilliant anchor worth the timeslot. Barbara Walters' special report with Dershkowitz was captivating and have a nice perspective. Ms. Walters was already well known for her serious yet sweetly delicate reports on Today, and this iconic reporting style extended to WNT and the rest of her career with the News division and the network. And Howard K. Smith gave such powerful commentary on the decrease in world peace thanks to the Jewish Reporters on trial, and what negative impact protests could give in similar situations.
Plus, the theme music. If there is something so iconic and memorable that begins with just four notes, that it would become the audible symbol of an entire news division, it is this tune.
As the years pass, the faces would change.
Reynolds would anchor the broadcast until his time off from illness and his death from bone cancer on July 20, 1983. Robinson and Jennings remained in a dual anchor format ever since until Robinson moved to the weekend edition and news briefs (until his leaving the News division in 1984; he later passed away from AIDS in 1988), while Jennings became sole anchor and senior editor on September 5 and holding the role-- through praise and high respect, until his untimely death from lung cancer at 67 on August 7, 2005. Other faces leading the program would later include Bob Woodruff and Elizabeth Vargas (in the first male-female dual anchor team since the ill-fated Reasoner/Walters pair-up), Charles Gibson, Diane Sawyer and current anchor (as of this post) David Muir.
While all network newscasts at the time definitely had the strong showing of objectivity, class, dignity, talent and emotion intertwined with both the anchors/correspondents/commentators and their reports, in my opinion, World News Tonight was the broadcast to watch; it was a unique format that drew me in from the word "go": three men bringing the News of importance from three different cities with their own distinct personalities separating them, but their one goal bringing them together and drawing me in in the process. In fact, many other viewers (although at time watched live, and I was still years from even being a semen) thought so too; since WNT's July 10 debut, ratings for it (and the network) gradually rose to the point of beating both Nightly News and the Evening News to become the nation's #1 evening network news program. And after watching this debut broadcast, you can probably see why.
For me though, that love for WNT extended to this this first broadcast. I was a longtime viewer since I was a child. One of my life's dreams and aspirations was to work in broadcast journalism. Mr. Jennings (as you know of course) was still anchor and his personality and long strong talents shone through to me and pulled me in every night, year after year. Because of him, he was a major inspiration to me and made my TV news dreams grow and grow ever since. His 2005 passing to me (and the rest of the country) was extremely devastating, but his legacy (along with those of Mr. Reynolds and Mr. Robinson) kept my aspirations alive -- along with my love of local TV news.
Well, that is my review of the first of many editions of World News Tonight (and yes, for reference and curiosity, many more are on YouTube. I hope you've had a good day, and I hope you've enjoyed it.
Here's to 40 years of such iconic reporting and reporters giving them and being such beacons of television news. And here's to 40 more.
Goodnight, everybody.