One of the most well-known journalists on American television was Peter Jennings. For 22 years, he was the only anchor of “World News Tonight” on ABC Television. After dropping out of high school and beginning his journalistic career by producing local newscasts for a Canadian TV network, he joined “ABC TV” to lead its primary nightly news show.
Although his inexperience was criticized, he returned to “World News Tonight” with great success after working as a foreign reporter reporting from the Middle East. Initially one of the show’s three anchors, he eventually took over as its only anchor and made a name for himself as an unceasing globetrotting television journalist, covering every combat zone and major global capitals in addition to all 50 states.
In order to keep his millions of viewers informed of the most recent developments, Jennings often remained on the air for marathon periods. He was much recognized for his ability to calmly and accurately narrate events that changed the globe as they occurred live. When the program was at its most successful, Peter Jennings was able to draw a nightly audience of 14 million people, sometimes outperforming rival networks CBS and NBC by more than two million viewers.
Personal Life
Peter Jennings, who had movie star good looks, was married four times. His first union took place on September 21, 1963, with Valerie Godsoe. When Valerie filed for divorce from him, the marriage ended.
He wed Anouchka (Annie) Malouf, a gorgeous Lebanese socialite and photographer, from 1973 until 1979.
He wed Kati Marton, a novelist and journalist for the “ABC,” for the third time in September 1979. The couple had two children together, Elizabeth (1979) and Christopher (1982), before divorcing in 1995.
He wed Kaycee Freed, a producer for “ABC News,” on December 6, 1997, and the couple stayed married until his death.
Peter Jennings passed away on August 7, 2005, from lung cancer. He left a $50 million inheritance behind, of which half was bequeathed to his wife Kaycee and the other half to his two children.
Michael Bloomberg, the mayor of New York City, renamed the street where “ABC” headquarters are situated “Peter Jennings Way” on February 21, 2006.
In January 2011, Peter Jennings was admitted to the “Academy of Television Arts and Sciences” Television “Hall of Fame.”
Early Years
Elizabeth (née Osborne) and Charles Jennings welcomed their son Peter Charles Archibald Ewart Jennings into the world on July 29, 1938, in Toronto, Canada. Charles, his father, had a high position in the “Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.” Sarah, Peter’s younger sister, existed.
Peter’s first experience with broadcasting came when he was only nine years old and served as the host of a half-hour children’s program called “Peter’s Program” on CBC Radio.
Peter began attending Trinity College School in Port Hope, Ontario, when he was 11 years old. However, once his father moved to the CBC headquarters in Ottawa, Peter transferred to Lisgar Collegiate Institute. But after failing his 10th grade, he left school. He later enrolled at Carleton University and the University of Ottawa, but he was unable to complete his degree.
Career
A local radio station, CFJR, hired Peter as a news reporter in 1959 when he was working as a teller at “Royal Bank of Canada” in Brockville. He began working for the brand-new Ottawa television station CJOH-TV in March 1961 with the intention of producing a late-night news program, but he quickly found himself anchoring a dance show. The following year, he became a co-anchor of the late-night news on “CTV,” the first private TV network in the country.
Peter began working for the ABC news department in New York in 1964, when the network was struggling to catch up with CBS and NBC in the ratings war. The 15-minute nightly broadcast “Peter Jennings with the News” debuted on February 1, 1965, with Peter serving as its anchor. At age 26, he was the network’s youngest-ever news anchor.
A struggling Jennings, who lacked experience, left the anchor desk in 1968 to start ABC’s Middle East bureau in Beirut, Lebanon, making it the first American TV network to have a presence in the region.
Peter was the first American television journalist to speak with Yasser Arafat, the leader of the “Palestine Liberation Organization,” as he chronicled the growth of the Palestinian “Black September Organization” in the 1970s.
When Jennings covered the ‘Black September’ slaughter of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympics in Munich, he quickly gained notoriety. By going so near to the captive facility, he was able to convey the unique film and the crucial political background to an uninformed American public.
He co-produced and served as lead reporter for the 1974 documentary “Sadat: Action Biography,” which was about Egyptian president Anwar Sadat and won him his first George Foster Peabody Award.
He came back to America to host “AM America,” ABC’s brand-new morning show, which debuted on January 6, 1975. Jennings relocated overseas once again as ABC’s top foreign reporter to cover the Middle East, but it failed quickly.
He was the first American or Canadian journalist to have an interview with Iranian Ayatollah Khomeini in 1978, while he was living in exile in Paris.
Jennings continued to cover all significant international events, including the Iranian Revolution and subsequent hostage crisis, Sadat’s murder, the Falklands War, Israel’s invasion of Lebanon, and John Paul II’s visit to Poland in 1983.
On August 9, 1983, “ABC” gave Peter Jennings a four-year contract after calling him back to Washington to fill in for the absence of Frank Reynolds, who had been diagnosed with blood cancer and eventually passed away. He was also appointed the senior editor and sole host for “World News Tonight” on September 5, 1983. He was based in New York.
He received praise for his 11-hour coverage of the Challenger space shuttle catastrophe in 1986 as well as for his quick and thorough reporting on the Loma Prieta earthquake in the San Francisco Bay region. ‘World News Tonight’ finished 1989 at the top of the ratings, defeating ‘CBS’ for the first time despite fierce opposition from ‘CBS’ and ‘NBC’.
‘ABC News’ highest-ever ratings came from Jennings’ coverage of the Gulf War, which began on January 16, 1991; he personally anchored for 20 hours during a marathon live coverage of 48 hours.
For giving the Bosnian War more coverage than the O.J. Simpson murder investigation in the middle of the 1990s, Jennings won praise from the critics. He received the “Goldsmith Career Award for Excellence in Journalism” from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, in large part because of his dedication to the topic.
The Canadian press complimented him for his in-depth coverage of the Quebec referendum in 1995 in particular. He was the sole anchor to broadcast from Canada on the day of the incident.
To create “The Century,” a book on 20th-century America, Jennings teamed up with Todd Brewster, a former “Life” magazine writer. The book was written to go along with a “ABC” series of the same name. After just one month of publication, the book reached the top of “The New York Times Best Seller” list in December 1998.
On March 29, 1999, “ABC” debuted “The Century,” a six-episode miniseries, with Jennings serving as the anchor. The 15-hour version of “The Century: America’s Time,” which was also hosted by Jennings, aired on “The History Channel” in April 1999.
On December 31, 1999, Jennings hosted ABC’s massive millennium eve spectacular, “ABC 2000 Today,” for a superhuman 23 hours nonstop. An estimated 175 million people turned in, smashing all the other networks hollow with 18.6 million viewers at prime time. The $11 million show made $5 million in revenues, but it had little lasting effect on the ratings; during the first week of the new millennium, “World News Tonight” dropped back to its number two position.
Peter Jennings is widely recognized for covering the September 11 assaults for 17 nonstop hours.
In 2001, Jennings and Brewster started writing “In Search of America,” their second book together. In order to promote it, he went on a 50-state tour in April 2002 and hosted a six-part television series in September 2002. The TV program was a hit, but the book did not do quite as well.
For long time, Jennings’ health was clearly declining, and on April 1, 2005, he made his farewell appearance on “World News Tonight.” He notified the viewers about his lung cancer and his wish to return as soon as possible via a recorded message; unfortunately, that was not to be.
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