Howard K. Smith
Encyclopedia
Howard 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
.
in Concordia Parish in eastern Louisiana
near Natchez
, Mississippi
, to Howard K. Smith, a nightwatchman descended from a poor but "gentleman-farming" family in Lettsworth
in Pointe Coupee Parish north of Baton Rouge
, and the former Minnie Gates, the daughter of a Cajun
riverboat
pilot.
Smith worked his way through Tulane University
in New Orleans, having studied German and journalism. After his graduation in 1936, with both bachelor of arts
degree, he signed on as a deckhand with a ship bound for Germany, where he briefly studied at Heidelberg University. In 1936, he spent a year as a reporter in New Orleans before securing a Rhodes Scholarship
to Oxford University's Merton College
, from which he graduated in 1939. Smith became active in student politics, mostly protesting Prime Minister
Neville Chamberlain
's seemingly soft attitude toward Nazism
. While at Oxford, he was the first American ever to chair the university Labour Club.
. In January 1940, Smith was sent to Berlin, where he joined the Columbia Broadcasting System under Edward R. Murrow
. He visited Hitler
's mountain retreat at Berchtesgaden
and interviewed many leading Nazis
, including Hitler himself, Schutzstaffel
or "SS" leader Heinrich Himmler
and Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels
. When Smith refused to include Nazi propaganda
in his reports, the Gestapo
seized his notebooks and threw him out of the country. He left for Switzerland on December 6, 1941, the day before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor
, Hawaii.
He was one of the last American reporters to leave Berlin before Germany and the United States went to war. His 1942 book, Last Train from Berlin: An Eye-Witness Account of Germany at War describes the reporter's observations from Berlin in the year after the departure of Berlin Diary
author William L. Shirer
. Last Train from Berlin became an American best-seller and was reprinted in 2001, shortly before Smith's death.
Unable to leave Switzerland, where he and his young wife spent most of the war, Smith reported whatever the Swiss government would permit. After the liberation of France, he began reporting on Germany and central Europe from Berne. By the winter of 1944-1945, he began sending vivid radio
accounts of the German counter-attack in the Ardennes
known as the Battle of the Bulge
, and he accompanied Allied forces across the Rhine River and into Berlin.
Smith became a significant member of the "Murrow Boys" that made CBS the dominant broadcast news organization of the era. In May 1945, he returned to Berlin to recount the German surrender.
. In 1949, Knopf published his The State of Europe, a 408-page country-by-country survey of Europe that drew on these experiences and that argued "both the American and the Russian policies are mistaken"; he advocated more "social reform" for Western Europe and more "political liberty" for Eastern Europe.
In 1959, Smith hosted a 21-week public affairs series entitled "Behind the News with Howard K. Smith". Broadcasts included a two-part program on Nikita Khrushchev
, the St. Lawrence Seaway, Fidel Castro
in Cuba
, and unemployment
problems in distressed areas.
In 1960, having established residence earlier in Bethesda, Maryland
, Smith chaired the first-ever televised presidential debates, held between U.S. Senator John F. Kennedy
of Massachusetts
and Vice President
Richard M. Nixon
.
In late 1961, Smith left his job at CBS when a dispute erupted over a documentary
called Who Speaks for Birmingham?. This in-depth investigation concerned the battle between civil rights forces and the police of Birmingham, Alabama
. Smith, an advocate of desegregation
, concluded his commentary at the end of the program by recalling the admonition commonly attributed to Edmund Burke
-- "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." Smith was told to remove the Burke quote from the end of the broadcast. Network president and founder William S. Paley
declined to support Smith over the matter, and Smith promptly left the network after twenty years of service. Smith declared that his hatred of discrimination stemmed from living in the racially segregated American South and from watching the Nazis in Europe during the world war.
at a time when that network's news division was a distant third among the "Big Three" networks. After the 1962 mid-term elections, Smith presented a documentary entitled, "The Political Obituary of Richard Nixon" as part of his Howard K. Smith: News and Comment
(1962–1963) television series
. Smith referred to Nixon's "last press conference
" after his disastrous losing campaign against Democrat
Edmund G. "Pat" Brown, Sr.
, for governor of California
. In that exchange, the former vice president famously told reporters that they would not "have Nixon to kick around any more." Smith included in the broadcast an interview with Nixon's longstanding nemesis Alger Hiss
, a convicted Cold War
perjurer
. Howard K. Smith: News and Comment aired in the 10:30 Eastern slot on Sundays, opposite CBS
's long-running quiz program What's My Line?
hosted by John Charles Daly
, who had been the first ever ABC news anchorman. ABC stood by Smith on the Nixon "obituary", but sponsors dried up for the program thereafter. It was revised in the 1963-1964 season as simply ABC News Reports.
He was a frequent interviewer with Bob Clark
on the ABC Sunday news program, Issues and Answers
, which began in 1960 but was revamped and renamed in 1981 as This Week with David Brinkley.
On June 5, 1968, Smith was anchoring coverage of the California
presidential primary that had stretched to 3 a.m. New York time. As the closing credits for the special were airing, word came in that U.S. Senator
Robert F. Kennedy
of New York had just been shot. ABC simply showed a wide shot of the chaotic newsroom
for several minutes until Smith was able to confirm the initial story and go back on the air with a special report. He continued at the anchor desk for several more hours for reports of Kennedy's condition.
In 1969, the veteran reporter became the co-anchor of the ABC Evening News, first with Frank Reynolds
, then the following year with another CBS alumnus, Harry Reasoner
. He began making increasingly conservative commentaries, in particular adopting a hard-line stance in support of the Vietnam War
. He contrasted President Lyndon B. Johnson
's decisive stance in Vietnam with the international failure to take preemptive action against Hitler. During this period, his son, future ABC newsman, Jack Smith (April 25, 1945—April 7, 2004), was serving with the U.S. Army
7th Cavalry Regiment in South Vietnam
and fought at the Battle of Ia Drang
. These commentaries endeared him to President Nixon, who rewarded him with a rare, hour-long, one-on-one interview in 1971, at the height of the administration's animus against major newspapers, CBS, and NBC.
During the 1972 presidential campaign
, a letter was published that Smith had written to the Democratic U.S. Senator Edmund S. Muskie of Maine
, indicating Smith's full support for Muskie. The endorsement was written on stationery with ABC's letterhead
. Nothing ever came of this controversy, however, and Smith kept his job. Notwithstanding his past temporary friendly relations with Nixon, who defeated U.S. Senator George S. McGovern of South Dakota
for reelection, Smith became the first national television commentator to call for Nixon's resignation over Watergate.
Smith remained as co-anchor at ABC until 1975, after which Reasoner anchored solo until Barbara Walters
joined the broadcast a year later. Continuing as an analyst until 1979, Smith left the network as the Roone Arledge
era was beginning at ABC News and full retirement age approached. Sources say that Smith was embittered over the reduction in time allowed for his commentaries and hence resigned after he criticized the revamped World News Tonight format as a "Punch and Judy show."
for radio journalism in 1957, and an award from the American Jewish Congress
in 1960.
Smith also appeared in a number of film
s, often as himself; The Candidate
(1972), Nashville (1975), Close Encounters of the Third Kind
(1977), The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
(1982), the television series
The Odd Couple (TV series)
- "The Odd Candidate" (1974) playing himself The Bionic Woman
- the "Kill Oscar" episode (1977) playing himself anchoring an ABC newscast, and both V (1983) and the subsequent 1984 television series.
Along with Last Train from Berlin, he wrote three other books, The Population Explosion (1960), a children's book Washington, D.C.; The Story of our Nation's Capital (1967), and a memoir Events Leading Up to My Death: The Life of a Twentieth-Century Reporter (1996).
; he died of pancreatic cancer
in Marin County
, California, days before what would have been his 59th birthday."
Smith also had a daughter, Catherine H. Smith of Los Angeles
, by his March 1942 marriage to the former Benedicte "Bennie" Traberg (September 25, 1921—October 29, 2008), then a 20-year-old journalist originally from Denmark, whom Smith called the most impressive person he had ever known "far above presidents and generals". There were three grandchildren.
Catherine Smith, who wrote her mother's obituary
, quoted from Smith's 1996 memoirs Events Leading Up to My Death, that their relationship "was born in an atmosphere of acute crisis." With World War II heating up, recalled Catherine Smith, and "both of them heading out of the German capital, they decided to marry just four days after their first date. My mother's young age required her return to Nazi-occupied Denmark for parental approval and the Danish queen's intervention to obtain traveling papers, but the couple reunited successfully three months later in Berne, Switzerland."
Mrs. Smith managed her husband's career, handled the finances and investments, and helped with the processing of his publications. Catherine Smith noted that her mother was the one most responsible for the development of Smith's patrician demeanor. "She was a formidable presence at his side and major force behind his success. She edited all his books and articles, and was his agent, negotiating all his broadcasting and other contracts. She arranged every aspect of what, in later years, became a very lucrative speaking career. When my parents traveled on the lecture
circuit, she once laughingly told a Lansing
, Michigan
, paper ... : 'My husband never knows where his trips will take him .... It's not until we get ready to board the plane that he'll inquire 'Where are we going?' and then I will tell him.'"
The Smiths lived at their Potomac River
home in Bethesda, Maryland, from 1958 until his death from pneumonia
, after which Mrs. Smith relocated to a condominium
on Marco Island
, Florida
. She died at age 87 of complications from hydrocephalus
. The Smiths are interred at historic Oak Hill Cemetery in the Georgetown
section of Washington, D.C.
Journalist
A 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...
, radio
Radio
Radio is the transmission of signals through free space by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible light. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space...
reporter, television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
anchorman, political commentator, and film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
actor. He was one of the original Edward R. Murrow boys
Murrow's Boys
Murrow’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....
.
Early life
Smith was born on May 12, 1914 in FerridayFerriday, Louisiana
Ferriday is a town in Concordia Parish in northeastern Louisiana, United States. The population, which is three-fourths African American, was 3,723 at the 2000 census....
in Concordia Parish in eastern Louisiana
Louisiana
Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...
near Natchez
Natchez, Mississippi
Natchez is the county seat of Adams County, Mississippi, United States. With a total population of 18,464 , it is the largest community and the only incorporated municipality within Adams County...
, Mississippi
Mississippi
Mississippi is a U.S. state located in the Southern United States. Jackson is the state capital and largest city. The name of the state derives from the Mississippi River, which flows along its western boundary, whose name comes from the Ojibwe word misi-ziibi...
, to Howard K. Smith, a nightwatchman descended from a poor but "gentleman-farming" family in Lettsworth
Lettsworth, Louisiana
Lettsworth is a small village located in the extreme northern tip of Pointe Coupee Parish, Louisiana, in the United States. It lies on the east bank of the Atchafalaya River near its intersection with the Mississippi River and the Red River at the Old River Control Structure. As of 2005, the...
in Pointe Coupee Parish north of Baton Rouge
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Baton Rouge is the capital of the U.S. state of Louisiana. It is located in East Baton Rouge Parish and is the second-largest city in the state.Baton Rouge is a major industrial, petrochemical, medical, and research center of the American South...
, and the former Minnie Gates, the daughter of a Cajun
Cajun
Cajuns are an ethnic group mainly living in the U.S. state of Louisiana, consisting of the descendants of Acadian exiles...
riverboat
Riverboat
A riverboat is a ship built boat designed for inland navigation on lakes, rivers, and artificial waterways. They are generally equipped and outfitted as work boats in one of the carrying trades, for freight or people transport, including luxury units constructed for entertainment enterprises, such...
pilot.
Smith worked his way through Tulane University
Tulane University
Tulane University is a private, nonsectarian research university located in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States...
in New Orleans, having studied German and journalism. After his graduation in 1936, with both bachelor of arts
Bachelor of Arts
A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...
degree, he signed on as a deckhand with a ship bound for Germany, where he briefly studied at Heidelberg University. In 1936, he spent a year as a reporter in New Orleans before securing a Rhodes Scholarship
Rhodes Scholarship
The Rhodes Scholarship, named after Cecil Rhodes, is an international postgraduate award for study at the University of Oxford. It was the first large-scale programme of international scholarships, and is widely considered the "world's most prestigious scholarship" by many public sources such as...
to Oxford University's Merton College
Merton College, Oxford
Merton College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. Its foundation can be traced back to the 1260s when Walter de Merton, chancellor to Henry III and later to Edward I, first drew up statutes for an independent academic community and established endowments to...
, from which he graduated in 1939. Smith became active in student politics, mostly protesting Prime Minister
Prime minister
A prime minister is the most senior minister of cabinet in the executive branch of government in a parliamentary system. In many systems, the prime minister selects and may dismiss other members of the cabinet, and allocates posts to members within the government. In most systems, the prime...
Neville Chamberlain
Neville Chamberlain
Arthur Neville Chamberlain FRS was a British Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940. Chamberlain is best known for his appeasement foreign policy, and in particular for his signing of the Munich Agreement in 1938, conceding the...
's seemingly soft attitude toward Nazism
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
. While at Oxford, he was the first American ever to chair the university Labour Club.
World War II
Upon graduating, Smith worked for the New Orleans Item, with United Press in London, and with The New York TimesThe New York Times
The 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...
. In January 1940, Smith was sent to Berlin, where he joined the Columbia Broadcasting System under Edward R. Murrow
Edward R. Murrow
Edward Roscoe Murrow, KBE was an American broadcast journalist. He first came to prominence with a series of radio news broadcasts during World War II, which were followed by millions of listeners in the United States and Canada.Fellow journalists Eric Sevareid, Ed Bliss, and Alexander Kendrick...
. He visited Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf 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...
's mountain retreat at Berchtesgaden
Berchtesgaden
Berchtesgaden is a municipality in the German Bavarian Alps. It is located in the south district of Berchtesgadener Land in Bavaria, near the border with Austria, some 30 km south of Salzburg and 180 km southeast of Munich...
and interviewed many leading Nazis
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
, including Hitler himself, Schutzstaffel
Schutzstaffel
The Schutzstaffel |Sig runes]]) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Built upon the Nazi ideology, the SS under Heinrich Himmler's command was responsible for many of the crimes against humanity during World War II...
or "SS" leader Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler was Reichsführer of the SS, a military commander, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. As Chief of the German Police and the Minister of the Interior from 1943, Himmler oversaw all internal and external police and security forces, including the Gestapo...
and Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels
Joseph Goebbels
Paul Joseph Goebbels was a German politician and Reich Minister of Propaganda in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945. As one of Adolf Hitler's closest associates and most devout followers, he was known for his zealous oratory and anti-Semitism...
. When Smith refused to include Nazi propaganda
Propaganda
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....
in his reports, the Gestapo
Gestapo
The Gestapo was the official secret police of Nazi Germany. Beginning on 20 April 1934, it was under the administration of the SS leader Heinrich Himmler in his position as Chief of German Police...
seized his notebooks and threw him out of the country. He left for Switzerland on December 6, 1941, the day before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor, known to Hawaiians as Puuloa, is a lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. Much of the harbor and surrounding lands is a United States Navy deep-water naval base. It is also the headquarters of the U.S. Pacific Fleet...
, Hawaii.
He was one of the last American reporters to leave Berlin before Germany and the United States went to war. His 1942 book, Last Train from Berlin: An Eye-Witness Account of Germany at War describes the reporter's observations from Berlin in the year after the departure of Berlin Diary
Berlin Diary
Berlin 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...
author William L. Shirer
William L. Shirer
William 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...
. Last Train from Berlin became an American best-seller and was reprinted in 2001, shortly before Smith's death.
Unable to leave Switzerland, where he and his young wife spent most of the war, Smith reported whatever the Swiss government would permit. After the liberation of France, he began reporting on Germany and central Europe from Berne. By the winter of 1944-1945, he began sending vivid radio
Radio
Radio is the transmission of signals through free space by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible light. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space...
accounts of the German counter-attack in the Ardennes
Ardennes
The Ardennes is a region of extensive forests, rolling hills and ridges formed within the Givetian Ardennes mountain range, primarily in Belgium and Luxembourg, but stretching into France , and geologically into the Eifel...
known as the Battle of the Bulge
Battle of the Bulge
The Battle of the Bulge was a major German offensive , launched toward the end of World War II through the densely forested Ardennes mountain region of Wallonia in Belgium, hence its French name , and France and...
, and he accompanied Allied forces across the Rhine River and into Berlin.
Smith became a significant member of the "Murrow Boys" that made CBS the dominant broadcast news organization of the era. In May 1945, he returned to Berlin to recount the German surrender.
Post-war
In 1946, Smith went to London for CBS with the title of chief European correspondent. In 1947, he made a long broadcasting tour of most of the nations of Europe, including behind the Iron CurtainIron Curtain
The concept of the Iron Curtain symbolized the ideological fighting and physical boundary dividing Europe into two separate areas from the end of World War II in 1945 until the end of the Cold War in 1989...
. In 1949, Knopf published his The State of Europe, a 408-page country-by-country survey of Europe that drew on these experiences and that argued "both the American and the Russian policies are mistaken"; he advocated more "social reform" for Western Europe and more "political liberty" for Eastern Europe.
In 1959, Smith hosted a 21-week public affairs series entitled "Behind the News with Howard K. Smith". Broadcasts included a two-part program on Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during part of the Cold War. He served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, and as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, or Premier, from 1958 to 1964...
, the St. Lawrence Seaway, Fidel Castro
Fidel Castro
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz is a Cuban revolutionary and politician, having held the position of Prime Minister of Cuba from 1959 to 1976, and then President from 1976 to 2008. He also served as the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba from the party's foundation in 1961 until 2011...
in Cuba
Cuba
The Republic of Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean. The nation of Cuba consists of the main island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and several archipelagos. Havana is the largest city in Cuba and the country's capital. Santiago de Cuba is the second largest city...
, and unemployment
Unemployment
Unemployment , as defined by the International Labour Organization, occurs when people are without jobs and they have actively sought work within the past four weeks...
problems in distressed areas.
In 1960, having established residence earlier in Bethesda, Maryland
Bethesda, Maryland
Bethesda is a census designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland, United States, just northwest of Washington, D.C. It takes its name from a local church, the Bethesda Meeting House , which in turn took its name from Jerusalem's Pool of Bethesda...
, Smith chaired the first-ever televised presidential debates, held between U.S. Senator John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John 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....
of Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
and Vice President
Vice President of the United States
The Vice President of the United States is the holder of a public office created by the United States Constitution. The Vice President, together with the President of the United States, is indirectly elected by the people, through the Electoral College, to a four-year term...
Richard M. Nixon
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...
.
In late 1961, Smith left his job at CBS when a dispute erupted over a documentary
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
called Who Speaks for Birmingham?. This in-depth investigation concerned the battle between civil rights forces and the police of Birmingham, Alabama
Birmingham, Alabama
Birmingham is the largest city in Alabama. The city is the county seat of Jefferson County. According to the 2010 United States Census, Birmingham had a population of 212,237. The Birmingham-Hoover Metropolitan Area, in estimate by the U.S...
. Smith, an advocate of desegregation
Desegregation
Desegregation is the process of ending the separation of two groups usually referring to races. This is most commonly used in reference to the United States. Desegregation was long a focus of the American Civil Rights Movement, both before and after the United States Supreme Court's decision in...
, concluded his commentary at the end of the program by recalling the admonition commonly attributed to Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke PC was an Irish statesman, author, orator, political theorist and philosopher who, after moving to England, served for many years in the House of Commons of Great Britain as a member of the Whig party....
-- "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." Smith was told to remove the Burke quote from the end of the broadcast. Network president and founder William S. Paley
William S. Paley
William 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:...
declined to support Smith over the matter, and Smith promptly left the network after twenty years of service. Smith declared that his hatred of discrimination stemmed from living in the racially segregated American South and from watching the Nazis in Europe during the world war.
ABC, 1962 – 1979
Smith moved to ABCAmerican Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
at a time when that network's news division was a distant third among the "Big Three" networks. After the 1962 mid-term elections, Smith presented a documentary entitled, "The Political Obituary of Richard Nixon" as part of his Howard K. Smith: News and Comment
Howard K. Smith: News and Comment
Howard K. Smith: News and Comment was a half-hour ABC news and documentary program hosted by commentator Howard K. Smith , which aired from February 14, 1962, to June 16, 1963...
(1962–1963) television series
Television program
A television program , also called television show, is a segment of content which is intended to be broadcast on television. It may be a one-time production or part of a periodically recurring series...
. Smith referred to Nixon's "last press conference
Richard Nixon's last press conference
The so-called "last press conference" of Richard Nixon took place on November 7, 1962 following his loss to Democratic incumbent Pat Brown in the 1962 California gubernatorial election...
" after his disastrous losing campaign against Democrat
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...
Edmund G. "Pat" Brown, Sr.
Pat Brown
Edmund Gerald "Pat" Brown, Sr. was the 32nd Governor of California, serving from 1959 to 1967, and the father of current Governor of California Jerry Brown.-Background:...
, for governor of California
Governor of California
The Governor of California is the chief executive of the California state government, whose responsibilities include making annual State of the State addresses to the California State Legislature, submitting the budget, and ensuring that state laws are enforced...
. In that exchange, the former vice president famously told reporters that they would not "have Nixon to kick around any more." Smith included in the broadcast an interview with Nixon's longstanding nemesis Alger Hiss
Alger Hiss
Alger Hiss was an American lawyer, government official, author, and lecturer. He was involved in the establishment of the United Nations both as a U.S. State Department and U.N. official...
, a convicted Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
perjurer
Perjury
Perjury, also known as forswearing, is the willful act of swearing a false oath or affirmation to tell the truth, whether spoken or in writing, concerning matters material to a judicial proceeding. That is, the witness falsely promises to tell the truth about matters which affect the outcome of the...
. Howard K. Smith: News and Comment aired in the 10:30 Eastern slot on Sundays, opposite CBS
CBS
CBS 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...
's long-running quiz program What's My Line?
What's My Line?
What's My Line? is a panel game show which originally ran in the United States on the CBS Television Network from 1950 to 1967, with several international versions and subsequent U.S. revivals. The game tasked celebrity panelists with questioning contestants in order to determine their occupations....
hosted by John Charles Daly
John Charles Daly
John Charles Patrick Croghan Daly John Charles Patrick Croghan Daly John Charles Patrick Croghan Daly (generally known as John Charles Daly or simply John Daly (February 20, 1914 – February 24, 1991) was an American journalist, game show host and radio personality, probably best known for hosting...
, who had been the first ever ABC news anchorman. ABC stood by Smith on the Nixon "obituary", but sponsors dried up for the program thereafter. It was revised in the 1963-1964 season as simply ABC News Reports.
He was a frequent interviewer with Bob Clark
Bob Clark (television reporter)
Bob Clark was a television reporter and White House Correspondent for ABC News from the 1960s until the 1970s. He is most remembered for reporting the assassinations of John F. Kennedy in 1963 and Robert F. Kennedy in 1968...
on the ABC Sunday news program, Issues and Answers
Issues and Answers
Issues and Answers was a once-weekly TV news program that was telecast by the American Broadcasting Company network from 1960 to 1981. It was distributed to the ABC affiliate stations early on Sunday afternoons for either live broadcast or video taped for later broadcast.Issues and Answers was...
, which began in 1960 but was revamped and renamed in 1981 as This Week with David Brinkley.
On June 5, 1968, Smith was anchoring coverage of the California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
presidential primary that had stretched to 3 a.m. New York time. As the closing credits for the special were airing, word came in that U.S. Senator
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
Robert F. Kennedy
Robert F. Kennedy
Robert Francis "Bobby" Kennedy , also referred to by his initials RFK, was an American politician, a Democratic senator from New York, and a noted civil rights activist. An icon of modern American liberalism and member of the Kennedy family, he was a younger brother of President John F...
of New York had just been shot. ABC simply showed a wide shot of the chaotic newsroom
Newsroom
A newsroom is the place where journalists—reporters, editors, and producers, along with other staffers—work to gather news to be published in a newspaper or magazine or broadcast on television, cable or radio...
for several minutes until Smith was able to confirm the initial story and go back on the air with a special report. He continued at the anchor desk for several more hours for reports of Kennedy's condition.
In 1969, the veteran reporter became the co-anchor of the ABC Evening News, first with Frank Reynolds
Frank Reynolds
Frank James Reynolds was an American television journalist for ABC and CBS News.He was a New York-based anchor of the ABC Evening News from 1968 to 1970 and later as the Washington D.C.-based co-anchor of World News Tonight from 1978 until his death in 1983...
, then the following year with another CBS alumnus, Harry Reasoner
Harry Reasoner
Harry Truman Reasoner was an American journalist for ABC and CBS News, known for his inventive use of language as a television commentator, and as a founder of the 60 Minutes program.-Biography:...
. He began making increasingly conservative commentaries, in particular adopting a hard-line stance in support of the Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
. He contrasted President Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon 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...
's decisive stance in Vietnam with the international failure to take preemptive action against Hitler. During this period, his son, future ABC newsman, Jack Smith (April 25, 1945—April 7, 2004), was serving with the U.S. Army
United States Army
The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...
7th Cavalry Regiment in South Vietnam
South Vietnam
South Vietnam was a state which governed southern Vietnam until 1975. It received international recognition in 1950 as the "State of Vietnam" and later as the "Republic of Vietnam" . Its capital was Saigon...
and fought at the Battle of Ia Drang
Battle of Ia Drang
The Battle of Ia Drang was the first major battle between the United States Army and the People's Army of Vietnam The Battle of Ia Drang was the first major battle between the United States Army and the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) The Battle of Ia Drang was the first major battle between the...
. These commentaries endeared him to President Nixon, who rewarded him with a rare, hour-long, one-on-one interview in 1971, at the height of the administration's animus against major newspapers, CBS, and NBC.
During the 1972 presidential campaign
United States presidential election, 1972
The United States presidential election of 1972 was the 47th quadrennial United States presidential election. It was held on November 7, 1972. The Democratic Party's nomination was eventually won by Senator George McGovern, who ran an anti-war campaign against incumbent Republican President Richard...
, a letter was published that Smith had written to the Democratic U.S. Senator Edmund S. Muskie of Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...
, indicating Smith's full support for Muskie. The endorsement was written on stationery with ABC's letterhead
Letterhead
A letterhead is the heading at the top of a sheet of letter paper . That heading usually consists of a name and an address, and a logo or corporate design, and sometimes a background pattern...
. Nothing ever came of this controversy, however, and Smith kept his job. Notwithstanding his past temporary friendly relations with Nixon, who defeated U.S. Senator George S. McGovern of South Dakota
South Dakota
South Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux American Indian tribes. Once a part of Dakota Territory, South Dakota became a state on November 2, 1889. The state has an area of and an estimated population of just over...
for reelection, Smith became the first national television commentator to call for Nixon's resignation over Watergate.
Smith remained as co-anchor at ABC until 1975, after which Reasoner anchored solo until Barbara Walters
Barbara Walters
Barbara Jill Walters is an American broadcast journalist, author, and television personality. She has hosted morning television shows , the television newsmagazine , former co-anchor of the ABC Evening News, and current contributor to ABC News.Walters was first known as a popular TV morning news...
joined the broadcast a year later. Continuing as an analyst until 1979, Smith left the network as the Roone Arledge
Roone Arledge
Roone Pickney Arledge, Jr. was an American sports broadcasting pioneer who was chairman of ABC News from 1977 until several years before his death, and a key part of the company's rise to competition with the two other main television networks, NBC and CBS, in the 1960s, '70s, and '80s.-Early...
era was beginning at ABC News and full retirement age approached. Sources say that Smith was embittered over the reduction in time allowed for his commentaries and hence resigned after he criticized the revamped World News Tonight format as a "Punch and Judy show."
Awards and film roles
Among honors which Smith received over the years were DuPont Awards in 1955 and 1963, a Sigma Delta Chi AwardSigma Delta Chi Award
The Sigma Delta Chi Awards are presented annually by the Society of Professional Journalists for excellence in journalism.- History :The Awards, according to the SPJ, did not begin in 1932 when the society chose six individuals for their contributions to journalism. In 1939 the awards program began...
for radio journalism in 1957, and an award from the American Jewish Congress
American Jewish Congress
The American Jewish Congress describes itself as an association of Jewish Americans organized to defend Jewish interests at home and abroad through public policy advocacy, using diplomacy, legislation, and the courts....
in 1960.
Smith also appeared in a number of film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
s, often as himself; The Candidate
The Candidate (1972 film)
The Candidate is a 1972 American film starring Robert Redford. Its themes include how the political machine corrupts. There are many parallels between the then-recent 1970 California Senate election between John V. Tunney and George Murphy; however, Redford's character Bill McKay is a political...
(1972), Nashville (1975), Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a 1977 science fiction film written and directed by Steven Spielberg. The film stars Richard Dreyfuss, François Truffaut, Melinda Dillon, Teri Garr, Bob Balaban, and Cary Guffey...
(1977), The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas is a musical with a book by Texas author Larry L. King and Peter Masterson and music and lyrics by Carol Hall...
(1982), the television series
Television program
A television program , also called television show, is a segment of content which is intended to be broadcast on television. It may be a one-time production or part of a periodically recurring series...
The Odd Couple (TV series)
The Odd Couple (TV series)
The Odd Couple is a television situation comedy broadcast from September 24, 1970 to July 4, 1975 on ABC. It starred Tony Randall as Felix Unger and Jack Klugman as Oscar Madison. It was based upon the play of the same name, which was written by Neil Simon.Felix and Oscar are two divorced men....
- "The Odd Candidate" (1974) playing himself The Bionic Woman
The Bionic Woman
The Bionic Woman is an American television series starring Lindsay Wagner that aired for three seasons between 1976 and 1978 as a spin off from The Six Million Dollar Man. Wagner stars as tennis pro Jaime Sommers who is nearly killed in a skydiving accident. Sommers' life is saved by Oscar Goldman ...
- the "Kill Oscar" episode (1977) playing himself anchoring an ABC newscast, and both V (1983) and the subsequent 1984 television series.
Along with Last Train from Berlin, he wrote three other books, The Population Explosion (1960), a children's book Washington, D.C.; The Story of our Nation's Capital (1967), and a memoir Events Leading Up to My Death: The Life of a Twentieth-Century Reporter (1996).
Family life
Smith's son, Jack, as an ABC correspondent received Peabody and Emmy awards for his coverage of technologyTechnology
Technology is the making, usage, and knowledge of tools, machines, techniques, crafts, systems or methods of organization in order to solve a problem or perform a specific function. It can also refer to the collection of such tools, machinery, and procedures. The word technology comes ;...
; he died of pancreatic cancer
Pancreatic cancer
Pancreatic cancer refers to a malignant neoplasm of the pancreas. The most common type of pancreatic cancer, accounting for 95% of these tumors is adenocarcinoma, which arises within the exocrine component of the pancreas. A minority arises from the islet cells and is classified as a...
in Marin County
Marin County, California
Marin County is a county located in the North San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco. As of 2010, the population was 252,409. The county seat is San Rafael and the largest employer is the county government. Marin County is well...
, California, days before what would have been his 59th birthday."
Smith also had a daughter, Catherine H. Smith of Los Angeles
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
, by his March 1942 marriage to the former Benedicte "Bennie" Traberg (September 25, 1921—October 29, 2008), then a 20-year-old journalist originally from Denmark, whom Smith called the most impressive person he had ever known "far above presidents and generals". There were three grandchildren.
Catherine Smith, who wrote her mother's obituary
Obituary
An obituary is a news article that reports the recent death of a person, typically along with an account of the person's life and information about the upcoming funeral. In large cities and larger newspapers, obituaries are written only for people considered significant...
, quoted from Smith's 1996 memoirs Events Leading Up to My Death, that their relationship "was born in an atmosphere of acute crisis." With World War II heating up, recalled Catherine Smith, and "both of them heading out of the German capital, they decided to marry just four days after their first date. My mother's young age required her return to Nazi-occupied Denmark for parental approval and the Danish queen's intervention to obtain traveling papers, but the couple reunited successfully three months later in Berne, Switzerland."
Mrs. Smith managed her husband's career, handled the finances and investments, and helped with the processing of his publications. Catherine Smith noted that her mother was the one most responsible for the development of Smith's patrician demeanor. "She was a formidable presence at his side and major force behind his success. She edited all his books and articles, and was his agent, negotiating all his broadcasting and other contracts. She arranged every aspect of what, in later years, became a very lucrative speaking career. When my parents traveled on the lecture
Lecture
thumb|A lecture on [[linear algebra]] at the [[Helsinki University of Technology]]A lecture is an oral presentation intended to present information or teach people about a particular subject, for example by a university or college teacher. Lectures are used to convey critical information, history,...
circuit, she once laughingly told a Lansing
Lansing, Michigan
Lansing is the capital of the U.S. state of Michigan. It is located mostly in Ingham County, although small portions of the city extend into Eaton County. The 2010 Census places the city's population at 114,297, making it the fifth largest city in Michigan...
, Michigan
Michigan
Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....
, paper ... : 'My husband never knows where his trips will take him .... It's not until we get ready to board the plane that he'll inquire 'Where are we going?' and then I will tell him.'"
The Smiths lived at their Potomac River
Potomac River
The Potomac River flows into the Chesapeake Bay, located along the mid-Atlantic coast of the United States. The river is approximately long, with a drainage area of about 14,700 square miles...
home in Bethesda, Maryland, from 1958 until his death from pneumonia
Pneumonia
Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung—especially affecting the microscopic air sacs —associated with fever, chest symptoms, and a lack of air space on a chest X-ray. Pneumonia is typically caused by an infection but there are a number of other causes...
, after which Mrs. Smith relocated to a condominium
Condominium
A condominium, or condo, is the form of housing tenure and other real property where a specified part of a piece of real estate is individually owned while use of and access to common facilities in the piece such as hallways, heating system, elevators, exterior areas is executed under legal rights...
on Marco Island
Marco Island, Florida
Marco Island is a city in Collier County, Florida, United States, located on an island by the same name in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Southwest Florida. It is a principal city of the Naples–Marco Island Metropolitan Statistical Area...
, Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
. She died at age 87 of complications from hydrocephalus
Hydrocephalus
Hydrocephalus , also known as "water in the brain," is a medical condition in which there is an abnormal accumulation of cerebrospinal fluid in the ventricles, or cavities, of the brain. This may cause increased intracranial pressure inside the skull and progressive enlargement of the head,...
. The Smiths are interred at historic Oak Hill Cemetery in the Georgetown
Georgetown, Washington, D.C.
Georgetown is a neighborhood located in northwest Washington, D.C., situated along the Potomac River. Founded in 1751, the port of Georgetown predated the establishment of the federal district and the City of Washington by 40 years...
section of Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
External links
- Museum of Broadcast Communications
- Who's Who in America, 1972 edition