Edward Roscoe Murrow, KBE (born Egbert Roscoe Murrow; April 25, 1908 – April 27, 1965) was an American broadcast
journalistA journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
. He first came to prominence with a series of
radio newsRadio News was an American monthly technology magazine published from 1919 to 1971. The magazine was started by Hugo Gernsback as a magazine for amateur radio enthusiasts, but it evolved to cover all the technical aspects to radio and electronics. In 1929 a bankruptcy forced the sale of Gernsback's...
broadcasts during
World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, which were followed by millions of listeners in the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and
CanadaCanada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
.
Fellow journalists
Eric SevareidArnold Eric Sevareid was a CBS news journalist from 1939 to 1977. He was one of a group of elite war correspondents—dubbed "Murrow's Boys"—because they were hired by pioneering CBS newsman Edward R. Murrow....
,
Ed BlissEdward "Ed" Bliss, Jr. was an American broadcast journalist and author of several books. He died in Alexandria, Virginia.- Bliss Before CBS :...
, and
Alexander KendrickAlexander Kendrick was a broadcast journalist. He worked for CBS during World War II and was part of a second generation of reporters known as Murrow's Boys.- Kendrick Before CBS :Before hooking up with Edward R...
considered Murrow one of journalism's greatest figures, noting his honesty and integrity in delivering the news.
A pioneer of television news broadcasting, Murrow produced a series of TV news reports that helped lead to the censure of Senator
Joseph McCarthyJoseph Raymond "Joe" McCarthy was an American politician who served as a Republican U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957...
.
Early life
Murrow was born Egbert Roscoe Murrow at Polecat Creek, near
GreensboroGreensboro is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the third-largest city by population in North Carolina and the largest city in Guilford County and the surrounding Piedmont Triad metropolitan region. According to the 2010 U.S...
, in
Guilford County, North CarolinaGuilford County is a county located in the U.S. state of North Carolina. In 2010, the Census Bureau estimated the county's population to be 491,230. Its seat is Greensboro. Since 1938, an additional county court has been located in High Point, North Carolina, making Guilford one of only a handful...
, the son of Roscoe C. Murrow and Ethel F. (née Lamb) Murrow. His parents were
QuakersThe Religious Society of Friends, or Friends Church, is a Christian movement which stresses the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers. Members are known as Friends, or popularly as Quakers. It is made of independent organisations, which have split from one another due to doctrinal differences...
. He was the youngest of three brothers and was a "mixture of
EnglishThe English are a nation and ethnic group native to England, who speak English. The English identity is of early mediaeval origin, when they were known in Old English as the Anglecynn. England is now a country of the United Kingdom, and the majority of English people in England are British Citizens...
,
ScotsThe Scottish people , or Scots, are a nation and ethnic group native to Scotland. Historically they emerged from an amalgamation of the Picts and Gaels, incorporating neighbouring Britons to the south as well as invading Germanic peoples such as the Anglo-Saxons and the Norse.In modern use,...
,
IrishThe Irish people are an ethnic group who originate in Ireland, an island in northwestern Europe. Ireland has been populated for around 9,000 years , with the Irish people's earliest ancestors recorded having legends of being descended from groups such as the Nemedians, Fomorians, Fir Bolg, Tuatha...
, and German" descent. His home was a
log cabinA log cabin is a house built from logs. It is a fairly simple type of log house. A distinction should be drawn between the traditional meanings of "log cabin" and "log house." Historically most "Log cabins" were a simple one- or 1½-story structures, somewhat impermanent, and less finished or less...
without electricity or plumbing, on a farm bringing in only a few hundred dollars a year from corn and hay.
When Murrow was 6 his family moved to Blanchard, Washington, 30 miles from the
CanadianCanada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
border, where they began
homesteadingThe homestead principle in law is the concept that one can gain ownership of a natural thing that currently has no owner by using it or building something out of it...
. He attended high school in nearby
EdisonEdison is a census-designated place in Skagit County, Washington, United States. The population was 133 at the 2010 census. It is included in the Mount Vernon–Anacortes, Washington Metropolitan Statistical Area.-Geography:...
, becoming president of the student body in his senior year and excelling on the debating team. He was on the
Skagit CountySkagit County is a county in the U.S. state of Washington. It is named after the Skagit Indian tribe. As of 2010, the population was 116,901. It is included in the Mount Vernon-Anacortes, Washington, Metropolitan Statistical Area...
championship basketball team. By that time, the teenage Murrow was going by the nickname "Ed". During his second year of college Murrow changed his name from Egbert to Edward.
In 1926 he enrolled at Washington State College, now
Washington State UniversityWashington State University is a public research university based in Pullman, Washington, in the Palouse region of the Pacific Northwest. Founded in 1890, WSU is the state's original and largest land-grant university...
, in
Pullman, WashingtonPullman is the largest city in Whitman County, Washington, United States. The population was 24,675 at the 2000 census and 29,799 according to the 2010 census...
, eventually majoring in speech. A member of the
Kappa SigmaKappa Sigma , commonly nicknamed Kappa Sig, is an international fraternity with currently 282 active chapters and colonies in North America. Kappa Sigma has initiated more than 240,000 men on college campuses throughout the United States and Canada. Today, the Fraternity has over 175,000 living...
Fraternity, Murrow was also active in college politics. In 1929, while attending the annual convention of the
National Student Federation of AmericaThe National Student Federation of America or NSFA was an association of student government founded in 1925. It was the first national student government association to be formed in the United States....
, he gave a speech urging college students to become more interested in national and world affairs; this led to his election as president of the federation. He then moved to
New YorkNew York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
after graduating in 1930.
He worked as assistant director of the
Institute of International EducationInstitute of International Education - is a non-profit organization promoting international exchange of education and training. It was established in 1919 and is based in the USA....
from 1932 to 1935, serving as the assistant secretary of the
Emergency Committee in Aid of Displaced Foreign ScholarsThe Emergency Committee in Aid of Displaced Foreign Scholars, , assisted scholars who were barred from teaching, persecuted and threatened with imprisonment by the Nazis. The Institute of International Education appointed Edward R. Murrow to lead the effort...
, which helped prominent German scholars who had been dismissed from academic positions. He married
Janet Huntington BrewsterJanet Huntington Brewster was an American philanthropist, writer, radio broadcaster and relief worker during World War II in London.-Life:...
on March 12, 1935. Their son, Charles Casey, was born November 6, 1945, in west
LondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
.
Career at CBS
Murrow joined
CBSCBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
as director of talks and education in 1935 and remained with the network for his entire career. CBS did not have news staff when Murrow joined, save for announcer
Bob TroutRobert "Bob" Trout was an American broadcast news reporter, best known for his radio work before and during World War II...
; his job was to line up newsmakers who would appear on the network to talk about the issues of the day. But the onetime Washington State speech major was intrigued by Trout's on-air delivery, and Trout gave Murrow tips on how to communicate effectively on the radio.
Murrow went to
LondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
in 1937 to serve as the director of CBS's
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
an operations. The position did not involve on-air reporting; Murrow's job was persuading European figures to broadcast over the CBS network, which was in direct competition with
NBCThe National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
's two radio networks. Murrow recruited journalist
William L. ShirerWilliam Lawrence Shirer was an American journalist, war correspondent, and historian, who wrote The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, a history of Nazi Germany read and cited in scholarly works for more than 50 years...
to take a similar post on
the continentContinental Europe, also referred to as mainland Europe or simply the Continent, is the continent of Europe, explicitly excluding European islands....
. The two men would become the forefathers of broadcast journalism.
Radio
Murrow gained his first glimpse of fame during the March 1938
AnschlussThe Anschluss , also known as the ', was the occupation and annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany in 1938....
, in which
Adolf HitlerAdolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
engineered the
annexationAnnexation is the de jure incorporation of some territory into another geo-political entity . Usually, it is implied that the territory and population being annexed is the smaller, more peripheral, and weaker of the two merging entities, barring physical size...
of
AustriaAustria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
by
Nazi GermanyNazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
. While Murrow was in
PolandPoland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
arranging a broadcast of children's choruses, he got word from Shirer of the annexation—and the fact that Shirer could not get the story out through Austrian state radio facilities. Murrow immediately sent Shirer to London, where he delivered an uncensored, eyewitness account of the Anschluss. Murrow then chartered a plane to fly from
WarsawWarsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
to
ViennaVienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
, so he could take over for Shirer.
At the request of CBS New York (most reference books say it was either chief executive
William S. PaleyWilliam S. Paley was the chief executive who built Columbia Broadcasting System from a small radio network into one of the foremost radio and television network operations in the United States.-Early life:...
or news director
Paul WhitePaul Welrose White from Pittsburg, Kansas worked as director of news at CBS beginning in 1930. He was CBS' first news director. White worked as a newspaper journalist prior to beginning his radio broadcasting career with CBS...
), Murrow and Shirer put together a "European News Roundup" of reaction to the Anschluss, which brought correspondents from various European cities together for a single broadcast. On March 13, 1938, the special was broadcast, hosted by Bob Trout in New York, and including Shirer in London (with
LabourThe Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...
MP
Ellen WilkinsonEllen Cicely Wilkinson was the Labour Member of Parliament for Middlesbrough and later for Jarrow on Tyneside. She was one of the first women in Britain to be elected as a Member of Parliament .- History :...
), reporter
Edgar Ansel MowrerEdgar Ansel Mowrer was a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author best known for his writings on international events.Born in Bloomington, Illinois, Mowrer graduated from the University of Michigan in 1913...
of the Chicago Daily News in Paris, reporter
Pierre J. HussPierre John Huss was a journalist and author, best known as a war correspondent during World War II.Huss was for many years chief International News Service correspondent in Berlin. He was part of an overseas reporting staff assembled by Edward R...
of the International News Service in
BerlinBerlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, and Senator
Lewis B. SchwellenbachLewis Baxter Schwellenbach , was an American lawyer, politician, and judge. He was born in Superior, Wisconsin.-Early life:When Schwellenbach was eight years old, his family moved to Spokane, Washington...
in Washington, D.C. Reporter Frank Gervasi, in
RomeRome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
, was unable to find a transmitter to broadcast reaction from the
ItalianItaly , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
capital, but phoned his script to Shirer in London, who read it on the broadcast.
Murrow himself reported live from Vienna, in the first on-the-scene news report of his career: "This is Edward Murrow speaking from Vienna.... It's now nearly 2:30 in the morning, and Herr Hitler has not yet arrived."
The broadcast was considered revolutionary at the time. Featuring multipoint, live reports in the days before modern technology (and without each of the parties necessarily being able to hear one another), it came off almost flawlessly. The special became the basis for the
World News RoundupThe CBS World News Roundup is a radio newscast that airs weekday mornings and evenings on the CBS Radio Network.It first went on-air on March 13, 1938 at 8 p.m...
—broadcasting's oldest news series, which still runs each weekday morning and evening on the
CBS Radio NetworkThe CBS Radio Network provides news, sports and other programming to more than 1,000 radio stations throughout the United States. The network is owned by CBS Corporation, and operated by CBS Radio ....
.
In September 1938, Murrow and Shirer were regular participants in CBS's coverage of the crisis over the
SudetenlandSudetenland is the German name used in English in the first half of the 20th century for the northern, southwest and western regions of Czechoslovakia inhabited mostly by ethnic Germans, specifically the border areas of Bohemia, Moravia, and those parts of Silesia being within Czechoslovakia.The...
in
CzechoslovakiaCzechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
, which Hitler coveted for Germany and eventually won in the
Munich AgreementThe Munich Pact was an agreement permitting the Nazi German annexation of Czechoslovakia's Sudetenland. The Sudetenland were areas along Czech borders, mainly inhabited by ethnic Germans. The agreement was negotiated at a conference held in Munich, Germany, among the major powers of Europe without...
. Their incisive reporting heightened the American appetite for radio news, with listeners regularly waiting for Murrow's
shortwaveShortwave radio refers to the upper MF and all of the HF portion of the radio spectrum, between 1,800–30,000 kHz. Shortwave radio received its name because the wavelengths in this band are shorter than 200 m which marked the original upper limit of the medium frequency band first used...
broadcasts, introduced by analyst
H. V. KaltenbornHans von Kaltenborn , generally known as H. V. Kaltenborn, was an American radio commentator. He was heard regularly on the radio for over 30 years, beginning with CBS in 1928...
in New York saying, "Calling Ed Murrow ... come in Ed Murrow."
During the following year, leading up to the outbreak of
World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, Murrow continued to be based in London. William Shirer's reporting from Berlin brought him national acclaim, and a commentator's position with CBS News upon his return to the United States in December 1940. (Shirer would describe his
BerlinBerlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
experiences in his best-selling book
Berlin DiaryBerlin Diary is a first-hand account of the rise of the Third Reich and its road to war, as witnessed by the American journalist William L. Shirer...
.) When the war broke out in September 1939, Murrow stayed in London, and later provided live radio broadcasts during the height of
the BlitzThe Blitz was the sustained strategic bombing of Britain by Nazi Germany between 7 September 1940 and 10 May 1941, during the Second World War. The city of London was bombed by the Luftwaffe for 76 consecutive nights and many towns and cities across the country followed...
. Those broadcasts electrified radio audiences as news programming never had before. Previously, war coverage had mostly been provided by newspaper reports, along with
newsreelA newsreel was a form of short documentary film prevalent in the first half of the 20th century, regularly released in a public presentation place and containing filmed news stories and items of topical interest. It was a source of news, current affairs and entertainment for millions of moviegoers...
s seen in movie theaters; earlier radio news programs had simply featured an announcer in a studio reading
wire serviceWire Service is an American drama series that aired on ABC as part of its 1956-57 season lineup.-Synopsis:Wire Service focuses on three reporters for the fictional Trans-Globe wire service, which was similar to real-life news wire services such as the Associated Press and United Press International...
reports.
Two famous phrases
Murrow's reports, especially during the Blitz, began with what became his signature opening, "This is London," delivered with his vocal emphasis on the word this, followed by the hint of a pause before the rest of the phrase. His former speech teacher,
Ida Lou AndersonIda Lou Anderson was a pioneer in the field of radio broadcasting. She was a professor at Washington State College in the 1920's and 1930's. One of Anderson's earliest and most impressive students was Edward R...
, suggested the opening as a more concise alternative to the one he had inherited from his predecessor at CBS Europe, Cesar Saerchinger: "Hello America. This is London calling." Murrow's phrase became synonymous with the newscaster and his network.
Murrow achieved great celebrity status as a result of his war reports. They led to his second famous catch phrase. At the end of 1940, with every night's German bombing raid, Londoners who might not necessarily see each other the next morning often closed their conversations not just with "good night", but with "good night, and good luck". The future British monarch,
Princess ElizabethElizabeth II is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,...
, said as much to the Western world in a live radio address at the end of the year, when she said "good night, and good luck to you all". So, at the end of one 1940 broadcast, Murrow ended his segment with "Good night, and good luck." Speech teacher Anderson insisted he stick with it, and another Murrow catch phrase was born.
When he returned to the U.S. in 1941, CBS hosted a dinner in his honor on December 2 at the
Waldorf-Astoria HotelThe Waldorf-Astoria is a luxury hotel in New York. It has been housed in two historic landmark buildings in New York City. The first, designed by architect Henry J. Hardenbergh, was on the Fifth Avenue site of the Empire State Building. The present building at 301 Park Avenue in Manhattan is a...
. There were 1,100 guests in attendance with millions more listening via radio.
Franklin D. RooseveltFranklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...
sent a welcome-back telegram, which was read at the dinner, and Librarian of Congress
Archibald MacLeishArchibald MacLeish was an American poet, writer, and the Librarian of Congress. He is associated with the Modernist school of poetry. He received three Pulitzer Prizes for his work.-Early years:...
gave an
encomiumEncomium is a Latin word deriving from the Classical Greek ἐγκώμιον meaning the praise of a person or thing. "Encomium" also refers to several distinct aspects of rhetoric:* A general category of oratory* A method within rhetorical pedagogy...
that commented on the power and intimacy of his wartime dispatches.
The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor occurred less than a week after this speech, and the U.S. entered the war as a combatant on the Allied side.
Murrow flew on Allied bombing raids in Europe during the war, providing additional reports from the planes as they droned on over Europe (recorded for delayed broadcast). Murrow's skill at improvising vivid descriptions of what was going on around or below him, derived in part from his college training in speech, aided the effectiveness of his radio broadcasts.
As hostilities expanded, Murrow expanded the CBS news staff. The result was a group of reporters acclaimed for their intellect and descriptive power, including
Eric SevareidArnold Eric Sevareid was a CBS news journalist from 1939 to 1977. He was one of a group of elite war correspondents—dubbed "Murrow's Boys"—because they were hired by pioneering CBS newsman Edward R. Murrow....
,
Charles CollingwoodCharles Collingwood was a television newscaster.Born in Three Rivers, Michigan, Collingwood graduated from Deep Springs College and Cornell University and in 1939 received a Rhodes Scholarship to study at Oxford University. After working in London for United Press, Collingwood was hired by Edward R...
,
Howard K. SmithHoward Kingsbury Smith was an American journalist, radio reporter, television anchorman, political commentator, and film actor. He was one of the original Edward R. Murrow boys.-Early life:...
, Mary Marvin Breckinridge,
Cecil BrownCecil Brown was the author of the book Suez to Singapore, which describes the sinking of HMS Repulse in December 1941. He also has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, at 6410 Hollywood Blvd. for his contribution to radio.. He was a war correspondent who worked closely with Edward R...
,
Richard C. HotteletRichard C. Hottelet was a Brooklyn-born American broadcast journalist for the latter half of the twentieth century. He continues to write and lecture....
,
Bill DownsWilliam Randall "Bill" Downs was a Kansas City-born American broadcast journalist for CBS Radio from 1942 to 1962.-During the War:...
,
Winston BurdettWinston Burdett was an American broadcast journalist and correspondent for the CBS Radio Network during World War II and later for CBS television news. He was born in Buffalo, New York. From 1937-1942 he was involved with the Communist Party...
,
Charles ShawCharles Shaw , was an American journalist who worked with Edward R. Murrow during World War II and then went on to be News Director and broadcast journalist at WCAU-TV, the CBS affiliate in Philadelphia....
,
Ned CalmerNed Calmer was a Chicago-born American journalist and author. He was a long-time CBS News analyst and close associate of Edward R. Murrow.-Work At CBS:...
, and
Larry LeSueurLarry LeSueur , born Laurence Edward LeSueur, was an American journalist, who was a war correspondent during World War II. He worked closely with Edward R. Murrow and was one of the original Murrow's Boys. He died in 2003 after a long battle with Parkinson's disease.-Early life:Larry LeSueur was...
. Many of them, Shirer included, were later dubbed "
Murrow's BoysMurrow’s Boys, or “The Murrow Boys,” were the CBS broadcast journalists most closely associated with Edward R. Murrow during his years at the network, most notably the years before and during World War II....
"—despite Breckinridge being a woman.
During his stay in London, Murrow fell in love with Winston Churchill's daughter-in-law, Pamela, whose other American lovers included Averell Harriman, whom she married many years later. Pamela wanted Murrow to marry her, and he considered it; however, after his wife gave birth to their only child, Casey, he ended the affair.
After the war, Murrow recruited journalists such as
Alexander KendrickAlexander Kendrick was a broadcast journalist. He worked for CBS during World War II and was part of a second generation of reporters known as Murrow's Boys.- Kendrick Before CBS :Before hooking up with Edward R...
,
David SchoenbrunDavid Schoenbrun , born in New York City, was an American broadcast journalist.He began his career teaching French and in WW2 served as a war correspondent from North Africa through to the liberation of France, for which he was decorated with the Croix de Guerre and the Legion of Honour.After the...
,
Daniel SchorrDaniel Louis Schorr was an American journalist who covered world news for more than 60 years. He was most recently a Senior News Analyst for National Public Radio...
and
Robert PierpointRobert Pierpoint was a American broadcast journalist who worked for CBS News.Born in Redondo Beach, California, Pierpoint served in the United States Navy during World War II. In 1948, he graduated from University of Redlands...
into the circle of the Boys, as a virtual "second generation", though the track record of the original wartime crew set it apart.
Murrow's report from the liberation of the Buchenwald concentration camp in Germany provides an example of his uncompromising style of journalism, something that caused a great deal of controversy and won him a number of critics and enemies. He described the exhausted physical state of the concentration camp prisoners who had survived, mentioned "rows of bodies stacked up like cordwood," and he refused to apologize for the harsh tone of his words:
Postwar broadcasting career
Radio
The relationship between Murrow and Shirer ended in 1947 in one of the great confrontations of American broadcast journalism, when Shirer was fired by CBS. He said he resigned in the heat of an interview at the time, but was actually terminated. The dispute began when J.B. Williams, maker of shaving soap, withdrew its sponsorship of Shirer's Sunday news show. CBS, of which Murrow was then vice president for public affairs, decided to "move in a new direction," hired a new host, and let Shirer go. There are different versions of these events; Shirer's was not made public until 1990.
Shirer contended that the root of his troubles was the network and sponsor not standing by him because of his comments critical of the
Truman DoctrineThe Truman Doctrine was a policy set forth by U.S. President Harry S Truman in a speech on March 12, 1947 stating that the U.S. would support Greece and Turkey with economic and military aid to prevent their falling into the Soviet sphere...
, as well as other comments that were considered outside of the mainstream. Shirer and his supporters felt he was being muzzled because of his views. Meanwhile, Murrow, and even some of Murrow's Boys, felt that Shirer was coasting on his high reputation and not working hard enough to bolster his analyses with his own research. Murrow and Shirer never regained their close friendship.
The episode hastened Murrow's desire to give up his network vice presidency and return to newscasting, and it foreshadowed his own problems to come with his friend
William S. PaleyWilliam S. Paley was the chief executive who built Columbia Broadcasting System from a small radio network into one of the foremost radio and television network operations in the United States.-Early life:...
, CBS' boss.
Murrow and Paley had become close when the network chief himself joined the war effort, setting up Allied radio outlets in Italy and
North AfricaNorth Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, linked by the Sahara to Sub-Saharan Africa. Geopolitically, the United Nations definition of Northern Africa includes eight countries or territories; Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, South Sudan, Sudan, Tunisia, and...
. After the war, he would often go to Paley directly to settle any problems he had. "Ed Murrow was Bill Paley's one genuine friend in CBS," noted Murrow biographer Joseph Persico.
Murrow returned to the air in September 1947, taking over the nightly 7:45 p.m. (
ETThe Eastern Time Zone of the United States and Canada is a time zone that falls mostly along the east coast of North America. Its UTC time offset is −5 hrs during standard time and −4 hrs during daylight saving time...
)) newscast sponsored by Campbell's Soup and anchored by his old friend and announcing coach
Bob TroutRobert "Bob" Trout was an American broadcast news reporter, best known for his radio work before and during World War II...
. (Trout left for NBC but returned to CBS in 1952.)
In 1950 Murrow narrated a half-hour
radio documentaryA radio documentary or feature is a purely acoustic performance devoted to covering a particular topic in some depth, usually with a mixture of commentary and sound pictures. It is broadcast on radio or published on audio media, such as tape or CD...
called "The Case for the Flying Saucers". It offered a balanced look at
unidentified flying objectA term originally coined by the military, an unidentified flying object is an unusual apparent anomaly in the sky that is not readily identifiable to the observer as any known object...
s, a subject of widespread interest at the time. Murrow interviewed both
Kenneth ArnoldKenneth A. Arnold was an American aviator and businessman. He is best-known for making what is generally considered the first widely reported unidentified flying object sighting in the United States, after claiming to have seen nine unusual objects flying in a chain near Mount Rainier, Washington...
(whose 1947 report kick-started interest in UFOs) and astronomer Donald Menzel (who argued that UFO reports could be explained as people misidentifying prosaic phenomena).
From 1951 to 1955 Murrow was the host of
This I BelieveThis I Believe was a five-minute CBS Radio Network program hosted by journalist Edward R. Murrow from 1951 to 1955. A half-hour European version of This I Believe ran from 1956 to 1958 over Radio Luxembourg....
, which offered ordinary people the opportunity to speak for five minutes on radio.
Murrow continued to present daily radio news reports on the CBS Radio Network until 1959. He also recorded a series of narrated "historical albums" for
Columbia RecordsColumbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...
called I Can Hear It Now, which inaugurated his partnership with producer
Fred W. FriendlyFred W. Friendly was a president of CBS News and the creator, along with Edward R. Murrow, of the documentary television program See It Now...
. In 1950 the records evolved into a weekly CBS Radio show,
Hear It NowHear It Now, an American radio program on CBS, began in December 1950, ending in June 1951. It was hosted by Edward R. Murrow and produced by Murrow and Fred W. Friendly. It ran for one hour on Fridays at 9 pm Eastern Time.- The show's beginnings :...
, hosted by Murrow and co-produced by Murrow and Friendly.
Television and films
As the 1950s began, Murrow began his television career by appearing in editorial "tailpieces" on the
CBS Evening NewsCBS Evening News is the flagship nightly television news program of the American television network CBS. The network has broadcast this program since 1948, and has used the CBS Evening News title since 1963....
and in the coverage of special events. This came despite his own misgivings about the new medium and its emphasis on pictures rather than ideas.
On November 18, 1951, Hear It Now moved to television and was re-christened
See It NowSee It Now is an American newsmagazine and documentary series broadcast by CBS from 1951 to 1958. It was created by Edward R. Murrow and Fred W. Friendly, Murrow being the host of the show. From 1952 to 1957, See It Now won four Emmy Awards and was nominated three times...
. After the pre-title sequence and introduction, viewers saw and heard host Murrow explain with a knowing smile, "This is an old team, trying to learn a new trade."
In 1953, Murrow launched a second weekly TV show, a series of celebrity interviews entitled
Person to PersonPerson to Person was a popular television program in the United States that ran from 1953 to 1961. Well-respected news reporter Edward R. Murrow hosted it until 1959, interviewing celebrities in their homes from a comfortable chair in his New York studio Person to Person was a popular television...
.
In 1960 Murrow played himself in the British war-time film
Sink the Bismarck"Sink the Bismark" is a song, written by country music singer Johnny Horton and Tillman Franks, based on the pursuit and eventual sinking of the German battleship Bismarck in May 1941, during World War II. Horton released this song in 1960, where it reached #3 on the charts...
.
Criticism of McCarthyism
See It Now focused on a number of controversial issues in the 1950s, but it is best remembered as the show that criticized
McCarthyismMcCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting roughly from the late 1940s to the late 1950s and characterized by...
and the Red Scare, contributing if not leading to the political downfall of Senator
Joseph McCarthyJoseph Raymond "Joe" McCarthy was an American politician who served as a Republican U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957...
.
On March 9, 1954, Murrow, Friendly, and their news team produced a half-hour See It Now special entitled "A Report on Senator Joseph McCarthy". Murrow used excerpts from McCarthy's own speeches and proclamations to criticize the senator and point out episodes where he had contradicted himself. Murrow and Friendly paid for their own newspaper advertisement for the program; they were not allowed to use CBS's money for the publicity campaign or even use the CBS logo.
Nevertheless, the broadcast contributed to a nationwide backlash against McCarthy and is seen as a turning point in the history of television. It provoked tens of thousands of letters, telegrams, and phone calls to CBS headquarters, running 15 to 1 in favor. In a retrospective produced for Biography, Friendly noted how truck drivers pulled up to Murrow on the street in subsequent days and shouted "Good show, Ed. Good show, Ed."
Murrow offered McCarthy a chance to appear on See It Now to respond to the criticism. McCarthy accepted the invitation and made his appearance three weeks later, but his rebuttal served only to further decrease his already fading popularity.
In the program following McCarthy's appearance, Murrow commented that the senator had "made no reference to any statements of fact that we made" and contested the personal attacks made by "the junior senator from
WisconsinWisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...
" against himself.
Later television career
Murrow's hard-hitting approach to the news, however, cost him influence in the world of television. See It Now occasionally scored high ratings (usually when it was tackling a particularly controversial subject), but in general it did not score well on prime-time television.
When a
quiz showQuiz Show is a 1994 American historical drama film produced and directed by Robert Redford. Adapted by Paul Attanasio from Richard Goodwin's memoir Remembering America, the film is based upon the Twenty One quiz show scandal of the 1950s...
phenomenon began and took TV by storm in the mid-1950s, Murrow realized the days of See It Now as a weekly show were numbered. (Biographer Joseph Persico notes that Murrow, watching an early episode of The $64,000 Question air just before his own See It Now, is said to have turned to Friendly and asked how long they expected to keep their time slot).
See It Now was knocked out of its weekly slot in 1955 after sponsor
AlcoaAlcoa Inc. is the world's third largest producer of aluminum, behind Rio Tinto Alcan and Rusal. From its operational headquarters in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Alcoa conducts operations in 31 countries...
withdrew its advertising, but the show remained as a series of occasional TV special news reports that defined
television documentaryDocumentary television is a genre of television programming that broadcasts documentaries.* Documentary television series, a television series which is made up of documentary episodes....
news coverage. Despite the show's prestige, CBS had difficulty finding a regular sponsor, since it aired intermittently in its new time slot (Sunday afternoons at 5 p.m. ET by the end of 1956) and could not develop a regular audience.
In 1956, Murrow took time to appear as the on-screen narrator of a special prologue for
Michael ToddMichael Todd was an American theatre and film producer, best known for his 1956 production of Around the World in Eighty Days, which won an Academy Award for Best Picture...
's epic production,
Around the World in 80 DaysAround the World in 80 Days is a 1956 adventure film produced by the Michael Todd Company and released by United Artists. It was directed by Michael Anderson. It was produced by Michael Todd, with Kevin McClory and William Cameron Menzies as associate producers. The screenplay was written by James...
. Although the prologue was generally omitted on telecasts of the film, it was included in home video releases.
Fall from favor
Murrow's reporting brought him into repeated conflicts with CBS, especially its chairman
Bill PaleyWilliam S. Paley was the chief executive who built Columbia Broadcasting System from a small radio network into one of the foremost radio and television network operations in the United States.-Early life:...
, which Friendly summarized in his book Due to Circumstances Beyond our Control. See It Now ended entirely in the summer of 1958 after a clash in Paley's office. Murrow had complained to Paley he could not continue doing the show if the network repeatedly provided (without consulting Murrow) equal time to subjects who felt wronged by the program.
According to Friendly, Murrow asked Paley if he was going to destroy See It Now, into which the CBS chief executive had invested so much. Paley replied that he did not want a constant stomach ache every time Murrow covered a controversial subject.
See It Nows final broadcast, "Watch on the Ruhr" (covering postwar Germany), aired July 7, 1958. Three months later, on October 15, 1958, in a speech before the Radio and Television News Directors Association in Chicago, Murrow blasted TV's emphasis on entertainment and commercialism at the expense of
public interestThe public interest refers to the "common well-being" or "general welfare." The public interest is central to policy debates, politics, democracy and the nature of government itself...
in his 'wires and lights' speech:
The harsh tone of the
ChicagoChicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
speech seriously damaged Murrow's friendship with Paley, who felt Murrow was biting the hand that fed him. Before his death, Friendly said that the RTNDA address did more than the McCarthy show to break the relationship between the CBS boss and his most respected journalist.
Beginning in 1958, Murrow hosted a
talk showA talk show or chat show is a television program or radio program where one person discuss various topics put forth by a talk show host....
entitled Small World that brought together political figures for one-to-one debates. In January 1959, he appeared on
WGBHWGBH-TV, channel 2, is a non-commercial educational public television station located in Boston, Massachusetts, USA. WGBH-TV is a member station of the Public Broadcasting Service , and produces more than two-thirds of PBS's national prime time television programming...
's The Press and the People with Louis Lyons, discussing the responsibilities of television journalism.
After contributing to the first episode of the documentary series CBS Reports, Murrow took a sabbatical from summer 1959 to mid-1960, though he continued to work on CBS Reports and Small World during this period. Friendly, executive producer of CBS Reports, wanted the network to allow Murrow to again be his co-producer after the sabbatical, but he was eventually turned down.
Murrow's last major TV milestone was reporting and narrating the CBS Reports installment "
Harvest of ShameHarvest of Shame was a 1960 television documentary presented by broadcast journalist Edward R. Murrow on CBS that showed the plight of American migrant agricultural workers. It was Murrow's final documentary for the network; he left CBS at the end of January 1961, at President John F...
," a report on the plight of migrant farm workers in the United States. Directed by Friendly and produced by David Lowe, it ran in November 1960, just after
ThanksgivingThanksgiving Day is a holiday celebrated primarily in the United States and Canada. Thanksgiving is celebrated each year on the second Monday of October in Canada and on the fourth Thursday of November in the United States. In Canada, Thanksgiving falls on the same day as Columbus Day in the...
.
Murrow portrayed himself in the British film production of
Sink the Bismarck!Sink the Bismarck! is a 1960 black-and-white British war film based on the book, the "Last Nine Days of the Bismarck" by C. S. Forester. It stars Kenneth More and Dana Wynter and was directed by Lewis Gilbert. To date, it is the only movie made that deals directly with the operations, chase, and...
in 1960, recreating some of the wartime broadcasts he did from
LondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
for CBS.
Murrow resigned from CBS to accept a position as head of the
United States Information AgencyThe United States Information Agency , which existed from 1953 to 1999, was a United States agency devoted to "public diplomacy". In 1999, USIA's broadcasting functions were moved to the newly created Broadcasting Board of Governors, and its exchange and non-broadcasting information functions were...
, parent of the
Voice of AmericaVoice of America is the official external broadcast institution of the United States federal government. It is one of five civilian U.S. international broadcasters working under the umbrella of the Broadcasting Board of Governors . VOA provides a wide range of programming for broadcast on radio...
, in January 1961. President
John F. KennedyJohn Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
offered Murrow the position, which he viewed as "a timely gift". CBS president
Frank StantonFrank Nicholas Stanton was an American broadcasting executive who served as the president of CBS between 1946 and 1971 and then vice chairman until 1973. He also served as the chairman of the Rand Corporation from 1961 until 1967.Along with William S. Paley, Stanton is credited with the...
had reportedly been offered the job but declined, suggesting that Murrow be offered the job.
On September 16, 1962, Murrow introduced educational television to
New York CityNew York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
via the maiden broadcast of WNDT, which became
WNETWNET, channel 13 is a non-commercial educational public television station licensed to Newark, New Jersey. With its signal covering the New York metropolitan area, WNET is a primary station of the Public Broadcasting Service and a primary provider of PBS programming...
.
Summary of television work
- 1951-58 See It Now (host)
- 1953-59 Person to Person (host)
- 1958-60 Small World (moderator and producer)
United States Information Agency (USIA) Director
Murrow's appointment as head of the
United States Information AgencyThe United States Information Agency , which existed from 1953 to 1999, was a United States agency devoted to "public diplomacy". In 1999, USIA's broadcasting functions were moved to the newly created Broadcasting Board of Governors, and its exchange and non-broadcasting information functions were...
was seen as a vote of confidence in the agency, which provided the official views of the government to the public in other nations. The USIA had been under fire during the McCarthy era, and Murrow brought back at least one of McCarthy's targets,
Reed HarrisReed Harris was an American writer, publisher, and U.S. government official.Harris was born on November 5, 1909, in New York City. He attended Staunton Military Academy and in 1932 graduated from Columbia College, where he edited the school newspaper, the Columbia Spectator...
. Murrow insisted on a high level of presidential access, telling Kennedy, "If you want me in on the landings, I'd better be there for the takeoffs." However, the early effects of
cancerCancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...
kept him from taking an active role in the
Bay of Pigs InvasionThe Bay of Pigs Invasion was an unsuccessful action by a CIA-trained force of Cuban exiles to invade southern Cuba, with support and encouragement from the US government, in an attempt to overthrow the Cuban government of Fidel Castro. The invasion was launched in April 1961, less than three months...
planning. He did advise the president during the
Cuban Missile CrisisThe Cuban Missile Crisis was a confrontation among the Soviet Union, Cuba and the United States in October 1962, during the Cold War...
but was ill at the time the president was assassinated. Asked to stay on by President
Lyndon B. JohnsonLyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...
, Murrow did so but resigned in early 1964, citing illness. Before his departure, his last recommendation was of
Barry ZorthianBarry Zorthian was an American diplomat, most notably press officer for years during the Vietnam war, media executive and lobbyist. "By his own reckoning, Zorthian was the last surviving member of the original cadre of U.S...
to be chief spokesman for the U.S. government in Saigon,
VietnamVietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...
.
Murrow's celebrity gave the agency a higher profile, which may have helped it earn more funds from Congress. His transfer to a governmental position did lead to an embarrassing incident shortly after taking the job, when he was compelled to ask the
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
not to show "
Harvest of ShameHarvest of Shame was a 1960 television documentary presented by broadcast journalist Edward R. Murrow on CBS that showed the plight of American migrant agricultural workers. It was Murrow's final documentary for the network; he left CBS at the end of January 1961, at President John F...
," which had been included in a collection of U.S. network television documentaries made available to other countries by the USIA.
According to some biographers, near the end of Murrow's life, when health problems forced him to resign from the USIA, Paley reportedly invited Murrow to return to CBS. Murrow, possibly knowing he could not work, declined Paley's offer.
Honors
- Murrow has been repeatedly honored with the Peabody Award
The George Foster Peabody Awards recognize distinguished and meritorious public service by radio and television stations, networks, producing organizations and individuals. In 1939, the National Association of Broadcasters formed a committee to recognize outstanding achievement in radio broadcasting...
, jointly and individually.
- In 1964, Murrow was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom
The Presidential Medal of Freedom is an award bestowed by the President of the United States and is—along with thecomparable Congressional Gold Medal bestowed by an act of U.S. Congress—the highest civilian award in the United States...
.
- He was made an honorary Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
by Queen Elizabeth II on March 5, 1965 and received similar honors from the governments of BelgiumBelgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
, FranceThe French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, and SwedenSweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
.
- He received "Special" George Polk Awards in 1951 and 1952.
- In 1967, he was awarded the Grammy Award
A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
for Best Spoken Word AlbumThe Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album has been awarded since 1959. The award had several minor name changes:*In 1959 the award was known as Best Performance, Documentary or Spoken Word...
for his Edward R. Murrow - A Reporter Remembers, Vol. I The War Years.
- The Edward R. Murrow College of Communication
The Edward R. Murrow College of Communication is a college of Washington State University named in honor of one of WSU's most famous alumni, Edward R. Murrow. The college was launched July 1, 2008. Previously it was the Edward R. Murrow School of Communication housed in the College of Liberal Arts...
at Washington State UniversityWashington State University is a public research university based in Pullman, Washington, in the Palouse region of the Pacific Northwest. Founded in 1890, WSU is the state's original and largest land-grant university...
is named in his honor.
- Edward R. Murrow High School
Edward R. Murrow High School, is located in the Midwood section of Brooklyn, New York City, New York and is part of the New York City Department of Education....
in BrooklynBrooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...
, New YorkNew York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
is named after him.
- Murrow Boulevard is a large thoroughfare in the heart of Greensboro
Greensboro is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the third-largest city by population in North Carolina and the largest city in Guilford County and the surrounding Piedmont Triad metropolitan region. According to the 2010 U.S...
, North CarolinaNorth Carolina is a state located in the southeastern United States. The state borders South Carolina and Georgia to the south, Tennessee to the west and Virginia to the north. North Carolina contains 100 counties. Its capital is Raleigh, and its largest city is Charlotte...
.
- A statue of native Edward R. Murrow stands on the grounds of the Greensboro Historical Museum.
Death
A chain smoker throughout his life, Murrow was known for almost never being seen without his trademark
CamelCamel is a brand of cigarettes that was introduced by American company R.J. Reynolds Tobacco in the summer of 1913. Most current Camel cigarettes contain a blend of Turkish tobacco and Virginia tobacco. Early in 2008 the blend was changed as was the package design.-History:In 1913, R.J...
cigarette. It was reported that he smoked anywhere from sixty to sixty-five cigarettes a day, equivalent to roughly three packs. See It Now was the first television program to have a report about the connection between
smokingSmoking is a practice in which a substance, most commonly tobacco or cannabis, is burned and the smoke is tasted or inhaled. This is primarily practised as a route of administration for recreational drug use, as combustion releases the active substances in drugs such as nicotine and makes them...
and
cancerCancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...
; Murrow said during the show that "I doubt I could spend a half hour without a cigarette with any comfort or ease." He developed
lung cancerLung cancer is a disease characterized by uncontrolled cell growth in tissues of the lung. If left untreated, this growth can spread beyond the lung in a process called metastasis into nearby tissue and, eventually, into other parts of the body. Most cancers that start in lung, known as primary...
and lived for two years after an operation to remove his left lung.
Murrow died at his home on April 27, 1965, two days after his 57th birthday. His colleague and friend
Eric SevareidArnold Eric Sevareid was a CBS news journalist from 1939 to 1977. He was one of a group of elite war correspondents—dubbed "Murrow's Boys"—because they were hired by pioneering CBS newsman Edward R. Murrow....
said of him, "He was a shooting star; and we will live in his afterglow a very long time." CBS carried a memorial program, which included a rare on-camera appearance by Paley.
Legacy
After Murrow's death, the Edward R. Murrow Center of Public Diplomacy was established at
Tufts University'sTufts University is a private research university located in Medford/Somerville, near Boston, Massachusetts. It is organized into ten schools, including two undergraduate programs and eight graduate divisions, on four campuses in Massachusetts and on the eastern border of France...
Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. Murrow's library and selected artifacts are housed in the Murrow Memorial Reading Room that also serves as a special seminar classroom and meeting room for Fletcher activities. Murrow's papers are available for research at the
Digital Collections and Archives at Tufts, which has a
website for the collection and makes many of the digitized papers available through the Tufts Digital Library.
The center awards Murrow fellowships to mid-career professionals who engage in research at Fletcher, ranging from the impact of the "new world information order" debate in the international media during the 1970s and 1980s to, currently, telecommunications policies and regulation. Many distinguished journalists, diplomats, and policymakers have spent time at the center, among them the late
David HalberstamDavid Halberstam was an American Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, author and historian, known for his early work on the Vietnam War, his work on politics, history, the Civil Rights Movement, business, media, American culture, and his later sports journalism.-Early life and education:Halberstam...
, who worked on his
Pulitzer PrizeThe Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
–winning book,
The Best and the BrightestThe Best and the Brightest is an account by journalist David Halberstam of the origins of the Vietnam War published by Random House. The focus of the book is on the foreign policy crafted by the academics and intellectuals who were in John F...
, as a writer-in-residence in the early 1970s. Veteran journalist
Crocker Snow, Jr.Crocker Snow, Jr. is the current director Edward R. Murrow Center for Public Diplomacy at Tufts University's Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. He is a veteran American journalist.-Early life:...
was named director of the Murrow Center in 2005.
In 1971 the RTNDA established the Edward R. Murrow Award, honoring outstanding achievement in the field of electronic journalism. There are four other awards also known as the "Edward R. Murrow Award," including
the oneThe Edward R. Murrow Award is a journalism/communication honor extended by the Edward R. Murrow College of Communication of Washington State University.The award is for "commitment to excellence that exemplifies the career of Edward R...
at Washington State University.
In 1973, Murrow's alma mater,
Washington State UniversityWashington State University is a public research university based in Pullman, Washington, in the Palouse region of the Pacific Northwest. Founded in 1890, WSU is the state's original and largest land-grant university...
, dedicated its expanded communication facilities the Edward R. Murrow Communications Center and established the annual Edward R. Murrow Symposium. In 1990, the WSU Department of Communications became the Edward R. Murrow School of Communication, followed on July 1, 2008, with the school becoming the
Edward R. Murrow College of CommunicationThe Edward R. Murrow College of Communication is a college of Washington State University named in honor of one of WSU's most famous alumni, Edward R. Murrow. The college was launched July 1, 2008. Previously it was the Edward R. Murrow School of Communication housed in the College of Liberal Arts...
. Veteran international journalist Lawrence Pintak is the college's founding dean.
In 1974, Saul Bruckner founded
Edward R. Murrow High SchoolEdward R. Murrow High School, is located in the Midwood section of Brooklyn, New York City, New York and is part of the New York City Department of Education....
in Brooklyn, New York.
Murrow in popular culture
- Murrow played himself in the 1960 film Sink the Bismarck!
Sink the Bismarck! is a 1960 black-and-white British war film based on the book, the "Last Nine Days of the Bismarck" by C. S. Forester. It stars Kenneth More and Dana Wynter and was directed by Lewis Gilbert. To date, it is the only movie made that deals directly with the operations, chase, and...
- The 1960 cartoon short Person To Bunny
Person to Bunny is a 1959 Merrie Melodies Bugs Bunny cartoon released on April 2, 1960. It stars Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and Elmer Fudd. The cartoon is posthumous because Arthur Q. Bryan died before the release of the cartoon.- Plot :...
, featuring Bugs BunnyBugs Bunny is a animated character created in 1938 at Leon Schlesinger Productions, later Warner Bros. Cartoons. Bugs is an anthropomorphic gray rabbit and is famous for his flippant, insouciant personality and his portrayal as a trickster. He has primarily appeared in animated cartoons, most...
, Daffy DuckDaffy Duck is an animated cartoon character in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons, often running the gamut between being the best friend and sometimes arch-rival of Bugs Bunny...
, and Elmer FuddElmer J. Fudd/Egghead is a fictional cartoon character and one of the most famous Looney Tunes characters, and the de facto archenemy of Bugs Bunny. He has one of the more disputed origins in the Warner Bros. cartoon pantheon . His aim is to hunt Bugs, but he usually ends up seriously injuring...
, is a parody of Murrow's Person to Person TV show. However, "Murrow" (identified as "Cedric R. Burrows") is only seen with his back facing to the audience.
- In 1986, HBO broadcast the made-for-cable biographical movie, Murrow, with Daniel J. Travanti
Danielo Giovanni "Daniel J." Travanti is an American actor best known for his starring role as Captain Frank Furillo in the 1980s television drama Hill Street Blues.-Biography:...
in the title role, and Robert VaughnRobert Francis Vaughn, , is an American actor noted for stage, film and television work. His best known roles include the suave spy Napoleon Solo in the 1960s television series The Man from U.N.C.L.E., wealthy detective Harry Rule in the 1970s television series The Protectors, Albert Stroller in...
in a supporting role.
- Murrow was parodied as newscaster Edward R. Hero in the animated ABC sitcom Dinosaurs
Dinosaurs is an American family sitcom that was originally broadcast on ABC from April 26, 1991 to July 20, 1994. The show, about a family of anthropomorphic dinosaurs, was produced by Michael Jacobs Productions and Jim Henson Television in association with Walt Disney Television and Buena Vista...
1992 episode "And the Winner Is...".
- In the BBC sitcom Goodnight Sweetheart
Goodnight Sweetheart is a sitcom that ran for six series on BBC1 from 1993 to 1999. It stars Nicholas Lyndhurst as Gary Sparrow, an accidental time traveller who leads a double life after discovering a time portal allowing him to travel between the London of the 1990s and the same area during the...
1995 episode "Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea", Murrow appears as the man who time traveler Gary Sparrow uses to tip off the Americans of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
- In 1998, the final episode of Murphy Brown
Murphy Brown is an American situation comedy which aired on CBS from November 14, 1988, to May 18, 1998, for a total of 247 episodes. The program starred Candice Bergen as the eponymous Murphy Brown, a famous investigative journalist and news anchor for FYI, a fictional CBS television...
had Murphy meeting Edward R. Murrow while visiting Heaven. Computer editing was used to insert footage of the real Murrow into the show. On a number of occasions during the show's 1988–98 run, newscaster Jim Dial refers to Murrow and other news legends, suggesting that they would join him in lamenting the state of current television. Eventually, responding to his question of "What would Edward R. Murrow say? What would Eric SevareidArnold Eric Sevareid was a CBS news journalist from 1939 to 1977. He was one of a group of elite war correspondents—dubbed "Murrow's Boys"—because they were hired by pioneering CBS newsman Edward R. Murrow....
say?" Corky Sherwood, tired of Jim's criticisms, responds, "They wouldn't say anything, Jim. You know why? Because they're dead!"
- In the 1999 film The Insider
The Insider is a 1999 film based on the true story of a 60 Minutes television series segment, as seen through the eyes of a real tobacco executive, Jeffrey Wigand. The 60 Minutes story originally aired in November 1995 in an altered form because of objections by CBS’ then-owner, Laurence Tisch, who...
, Lowell BergmanLowell A. Bergman is an American investigative reporter with The New York Times and a producer/correspondent for the PBS documentary series Frontline...
, a television producer for the CBS news magazine 60 Minutes60 Minutes is an American television news magazine, which has run on CBS since 1968. The program was created by producer Don Hewitt who set it apart by using a unique style of reporter-centered investigation....
, played by Al PacinoAlfredo James "Al" Pacino is an American film and stage actor and director. He is famous for playing mobsters, including Michael Corleone in The Godfather trilogy, Tony Montana in Scarface, Alphonse "Big Boy" Caprice in Dick Tracy and Carlito Brigante in Carlito's Way, though he has also appeared...
, is confronted by Mike WallaceMyron Leon "Mike" Wallace is an American journalist, former game show host, actor and media personality. During his 60+ year career, he has interviewed a wide range of prominent newsmakers....
, played by Christopher PlummerArthur Christopher Orne Plummer, CC is a Canadian theatre, film and television actor. He made his film debut in 1957's Stage Struck, and notable early film performances include Night of the Generals, The Return of the Pink Panther and The Man Who Would Be King.In a career that spans over five...
, after an exposé of the tobacco industry is edited down to suit CBS management and then, itself, gets exposed in the press for the self-censorship. Wallace passes Bergman an editorial printed in The New York TimesThe New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, which accuses CBS of betraying the legacy of Edward R. Murrow.
- On their 2003 album Say You Will
Say You Will is the 17th album by British/American band Fleetwood Mac, released in 2003. It was the first Fleetwood Mac album in 34 years not to include tracks written by vocalist/keyboardist Christine McVie, who had left the group in 1998. McVie is featured on two songs, which had been originally...
, Fleetwood MacFleetwood Mac are a British–American rock band formed in 1967 in London.The only original member present in the band is its eponymous drummer, Mick Fleetwood...
recorded a song called "Murrow Turning Over in His Grave"Murrow Turning Over in His Grave" is the second track on Fleetwood Mac's 2003 album Say You Will. It was written and performed by Lindsey Buckingham.-Structure:...
", referring to him as an icon of responsible journalism.
- Good Night, and Good Luck is a 2005 Oscar-nominated film directed and co-written by George Clooney
George Timothy Clooney is an American actor, film director, producer, and screenwriter. For his work as an actor, he has received two Golden Globe Awards and an Academy Award...
about the conflict between Murrow and Joseph McCarthyJoseph Raymond "Joe" McCarthy was an American politician who served as a Republican U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957...
on See It Now. Murrow is portrayed by actor David StrathairnDavid Russell Strathairn is an American actor. He was nominated for an Academy Award for portraying journalist Edward R. Murrow in Good Night, and Good Luck...
, who received an OscarAn Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
nomination. In the film, Murrow's conflict with CBS boss Bill Paley occurs immediately after his skirmish with McCarthy.
Exhibits and monuments
Biographies and articles
- "Murrow, Edward R." in Current Biography, 1942.
- "Murrow, Edward R." in American National Biography (New York: Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...
, 1999), Vol. 16.
- Edward R. Murrow and the Birth of Broadcast Journalism, by Bob Edwards
Robert Alan Edwards is a Peabody Award-winning member of the National Radio Hall of Fame. He was the first broadcaster with a large national following to join the field of satellite radio...
(ISBN 0-471-47753-2)
- Kendrick, Alexander "Prime Time: The Life of Edward R. Murrow" (New York).
- Sperber, A.M. "Murrow: His Life and Times" (New York:Freundlich Books 1986) reprinted by Fordham University Press
- Murrow, Edward R. and Ed Bliss, "In Search of Light: The News Broadcasts of Edward R. Murrow" (New York: Alfred A. Knopf)
- Olson, Lynne, "Citizens of London" (New York: Random House) 2010
Programs