R.I.P. Walter Cronkite

I don't know if anyone saw the news this week, but I'd like to take a moment to note the passing of a great American, Walter Cronkite. Cronkite, while not the first TV news anchor, defined the role and what we expect in a network news anchor. Beginning his career in radio in WWII and later moving into television, Cronkite narrated the timeline of the lives of the Baby Boomer generation, from the early days of the space program to the civil rights movement to the Kennedy assasinations to Vietnam to Watergate to the Iran Hostage Crisis. Cronkite brought us man's first steps on the moon and the Beatles' first steps in America. He helped Middle Americans understand complex issues with footage from foreign lands that previously had been reduced to inches below the fold. Although he officially retired in 1980, Cronkite continued to appear periodically on CBS News, notably appearing in the aftermath of 9/11.

We don't often think about the power of the news as an educational tool but, until the advent of 24-hour cable news and the Internet, the news was the primary means of informing the masses about the world beyond their driveways.

So profound was Cronkite's hold on the American people that he was called "the most trusted man in America" and LBJ said, after a critical opinion piece by Cronkite, "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost Middle America" and decided not to seek reelection. He was Uncle Walter, seen as one of the few people who would give it to us straight in an era where the government was most definitely not to be trusted and fewer sunshine laws existed. In his folksy yet authoritative way, he shaped the way America views television news and what we expect of our reporters and anchors. He was more than just a newsman, he was an icon, and, for many of us, an accent to childhood memories of family dinners and discussions always with his voice in the background. From Uncle Walter I learned that the world was bigger than my hometown.

Walter Cronkite will be missed but his legacy is with us in every newscast every day. "And that's the way it is...."