Farewell, Peter Jennings

Along with many others, I set my alarm for 5:00 this morning so I could watch the space shuttle land.  I turned on the TV and expected to see Commander Collins landing Discovery, but the news story I heard wasn't from NASA; it was news that Peter Jennings had died yesterday.  He was only 67.  He shocked "World News Tonight" viewers in April when he announced on the air that he had lung cancer. 

Peter Jennings delivered the news to Americans in five decades.  He was the face of ABC news whenever a big story broke. He was on their air for more than 60 hours during the week of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.  My family and I kept the TV tuned to ABC that week, and like millions of viewers, we found a bit of comfort and reassurance from Jennings. He was criticized by the media for his display of emotions on the air after the attacks, and for his comments about why the President didn't come directly back to D.C. when the heard about the attacks. 

Broadcasting was in Jennings' blood.  His father Charles was the first person to anchor a nightly national news program in Canada.  It must have rubbed off; Peter had a Saturday morning radio show in Ottawa by the age of 9.  He never completed high school or college, something that he regretted.  He said he made up for it by being a student of the world, studying cultures and their people for the rest of his life.

When he was 26, he was hired by ABC to be their evening news anchor.  The critics tore him apart because of his inexperience.  ABC had hoped his youthfulness would attract the younger viewers.  After 3 years, ABC pulled him from behind the news desk and assigned him to a position as a foreign correspondent.  He blew away the competition.  He became an expert on the middle east, and won a Peabody Award for a 1974 profile of Anwar Sadat.

My first memory of Peter Jennings on the news was his coverage of the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre.  I was only 9 years old, and didn't pay much attention to the nightly news, but I remember watching Jennings give reports about the Palestinian terrorists holding the Isreali athletes hostage and eventually killing them.  I can still visualize the film footage from his report, showing one of the terrorists, said to be a PLO member, wearing a ski mask. I found out later that Jennings and his film crew were hiding in one of the dormatories, just feet away from where the terrorists were holding the athletes hostage.  I remember his voice being calm, almost soothing, when he gave the reports.

"World News Tonight" will never be the same.  We'll miss you, Peter Jennings.