Walter Cronkite, the legendary TV news anchor once known as the “most trusted man in America,” has died at the age of 92. Cronkite anchoredthe CBS Evening News from 1962 to 1981 with his trademark sign-off, “And that’s the way it is…”
I have been missing Walter Cronkite, as a part of my daily life, for quite a long time now. And now, I shall miss him even more. As a fatherless child, growing up in the hurly-burly of the last half of the 20th century, I needed a few reliable, clear-thinking, righteous men in my life. “Uncle Walter,” as he came to be known, was at the top of my list.
Being a teenager in the Sixties was not an easy road to go. And even when the world seemed to be in total self-destruct mode, Walter Cronkite would sort it all out, every night. “Uncle Walter” would be there to explain why and how unbelievable things happen and somehow reassure us all that we would get through it. Even be better for it.
Through all of the defining moments of the Sixties, Cronkite was by our sides, daily, making some sense of it all and telling us “and that’s the way it is . . .”. Here are a few examples of that:
It was almost unthinkable that Walter Cronkite would retire, but, of
course he should. He had served well and given years of his life to
something that he believed in passionately. And he had done it
arguably better than anyone else.
Cronkite also had tremendous influence, built on trust. When he became critical of U.S. involvement in Vietnam, after the Tet Offensive, then-President Lyndon Johnson said “If I’ve lost Cronkite, I’ve lost middle America.” Johnson decided not to run for re-election after that.
I think that one of the things that I most respected about “Uncle
Walter” actually occurred after he retired. Cronkite lived to see the
huge changes that occurred in his field as a result of the rise of
cable television and the Internet. But while journalists much younger
than he were grumbling about the changing landscape of news media,
especially about the rise of “citizen journalism,” Walter Cronkite
quietly took himself off to “where the action was” and put his
“imprimatur” on citizen journalism by writing blog posts for the Huffington
Post.
Walter Cronkite was an extraordinary man and we will miss him for many
reason and in many ways. Barbara Walters, a news legend in her own
right” put it very well when she said:
“There never was and there never will be another Walter Cronkite. We
trusted him and that trust was well founded. He was also a jolly and
supportive friend. He will be missed by each of us individually who
knew him and by the whole country who loved him.”
Walter Cronkite Uncle Walter Huffington Post
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