SARASOTA, Fla. -- Former CBS newscaster Douglas Edwards, who had been a continuous anchor longer than any other broadcast journalist before retiring in 1988, died Saturday after a two-year bout with cancer. He was 73.
Edwards' wife, May, said he died at home at 10:40 a.m. She said he had been undergoing treatment for cancer of the bladder since 1988, the year he retired.
'He would be okay for a while and then he would get sick,' she said. 'I guess he's really been ill most of the two years since his retirement.'
She said services for Edwards were scheduled for 3 p.m. Wednesday at the Church of the Palms in Sarasota and that Edwards was to be cremated.
Edwards anchored a daily network television newscast without interruption from 1948 until his retirement.
'The trail he blazed at the dawn of television is one that broadcast journalists can follow with great confidence and enormous admiration,' said Howard Stringer, president of teh CBS Broadcast Group. 'His integrity, his dignity and innate gentleness made him a man for all our seasons.'
Edwards had been a continuous anchor longer than any other broadcast journalist when he ended his career in journalism at the age of 70 on April 1, 1988, saing he intended to retire to Florida to write his memoirs.
'I've seen the whole span of electronic journalism,' Edwards said proudly in a CBS interview on his last day on the job. 'I have seen it all really from the time I got into this business at age 15 in, well, 1932 is when it was.'
Edwards described himself as both sad and 'pepped up' about leaving CBS and said he would lecture and continue to write.
Edwards was the first anchor of a CBS News program for television, and the first of only three men to permanently anchor the evening news for the network. The other two are Walter Cronkite and Dan Rather.
'Because he was a pioneer and achieved so much as a professional, Douglas Edwards is in the pantheon of news broadcaster,' Rather said upon learning of Edwards' death. 'Because of the kind of person he was -- a man of unfailing decency and kindness -- he is in our hearts forever.'
Looking back over his almost 46-year career with CBS after his retirement, Edwards once said:
'I think there were several real high spots. I've covered conventions, World War II in Europe with Ed Murrow, the sinking of the Andrea Doria -- I happened to get a clean television newsbreak on that. I've covered floods and assassinations, the Nixon story.
'The story I liked very much was the announcement of the Salk vaccine. We went out with a camera crew and took our family doctor from Weston, Conn., and told the story of the Salk vaccine for polio and what it would mean to America's little folks. It was one of the nicest stories.
'There aren't too many nice stories. America takes its good news for granted.'
Among the most unforgettable people he encountered in his career he included Adlai Stevenson, Dwight Eisenhower, Edward R. Murrow, Winston Churchill and Eleanor Roosevelt -- 'she really lit a candle.'
'I interviewed her two or three times,' Edwards said. 'She was awfully good at television. She smiled a lot when she was talking about rather serious things and I found myself admiring that ability. One of my problems on televison has been smiling if I didn't have anything to smile about.'
Edwards was born July 14, 1917, in Ada, Okla. He began his career as a radio reporter in Troy, Ala., when he was 15 and still in high school. After completing his education at the University of Alabama, Emory University and University of Georgia Evening College, he worked for radio stations in Atlanta and Detroit. He joined CBS Radio in New York in 1942.
He served with Murrow in Europe, then returned to New York in 1946 to anchor the 'CBS World News Roundup.'
On Aug. 15, 1948, he began his anchor chores for CBS's first Monday- through-Friday evening news television program, 'Douglas Edwards With The News,' the forerunner of today's 'CBS Evening News.'
Its signal went out from a primitive studio in New York's Grand Central Terminal to five Eastern cities, and whenever trains looped under the railroad terminal, the picture would shake.
Edwards anchored the program until 1962, when he moved to the CBS News daytime broadcasts and was succeeded by Cronkite on the evening news.
The CBS news correspondent at the time of his retirement anchored the midmorning edition of 'Newsbreak' and the Sunday morning series, 'For Our Times,' which viewed the news from a religious and cultural perspective.
He retired after celebrations marking the 50th anniversary of the 'World News Roundup,' the country's oldest network radio newscast, which premiered on CBS March 13, 1938. He had reported on 'World News Roundup' since joining CBS.
'Along with Dave Garroway and Ed Sullivan and Jack Webb and the other pioneers, Doug ushered in the television era,' said Don Hewitt, executive producer of 60 Minutes and associate director of the original Douglas Edwards With The News.
'He was the first of that incredible array of CBS newsmen to make the leap from radio to television. Whatever is good and right about tv news today, Doug Edwards can claim a lion's share of the credit.'
At the time of his death, Edwards was married to the former May Hamilton Dunbar. He has three children from a previous marriage.
She said services for Edwards, 73, were scheduled for 3 p.m. Wednesday at the Church of the Palms in Sarasota. She said Edwards was to be cremated.
Edwards anchored a daily network television newscast without interruption from 1948 until his retirement.
Edwards had been a continuous anchor longer than any other broadcast journalist when he ended his career in journalism at the age of 70 on April 1, 1988, saing he intended to retire to Florida to write his memoirs.
'I've seen the whole span of electronic journalism,' Edwards said proudly in a CBS interview on his last day on the job. 'I have seen it all really from the time I got into this business at age 15 in, well, 1932 is when it was.'
Edwards described himself as both sad and 'pepped up' about leaving CBS and said he would lecture and continue to write.
Edwards was the first anchor of a CBS News program for television, and the first of only three men to permanently anchor the evening news for the network. The other two are Walter Cronkite and Dan Rather.
'It's time to move on and look at some new vistas and sit in the sun in Florida and enjoy that for a while,' Edwards said in an interview.
Looking back over his almost 46-year career with CBS, he said:
'I think there were several real high spots. I've covered conventions, World War II in Europe with Ed Murrow, the sinking of the Andrea Doria -- I happened to get a clean television newsbreak on that. I've covered floods and assassinations, the Nixon story.
'The story I liked very much was the announcement of the Salk vaccine. We went out with a camera crew and took our family doctor from Weston, Conn., and told the story of the Salk vaccine for polio and what it would mean to America's little folks. It was one of the nicest stories.
'There aren't too many nice stories. America takes its good news for granted.'NEWLN: more
Among the most unforgettable people he encountered in his career he included Adlai Stevenson, Dwight Eisenhower, Edward R. Murrow, Winston Churchill and Eleanor Roosevelt -- 'she really lit a candle.'
'I interviewed her two or three times,' Edwards said. 'She was awfully good at television. She smiled a lot when she was talking about rather serious things and I found myself admiring that ability. One of my problems on televison has been smiling if I didn't have anything to smile about.'
Edwards was born July 14, 1917, in Ada, Okla.. He began his career as a radio reporter in Troy, Ala., when he was 15 and still in high school. After completing his education at the University of Alabama, Emory University and University of Georgia Evening College, he worked for radio stations in Atlanta and Detroit. He joined CBS Radio in New York in 1942.
He served with Murrow in Europe, then returned to New York in 1946 to anchor the 'CBS World News Roundup.'
On Aug. 15, 1948, he began his anchor chores for CBS's first Monday- through-Friday evening news television program, 'Douglas Edwards With The News,' the forerunner of today's 'CBS Evening News.'
Its signal went out from a primitive studio in New York's Grand Central Terminal to five Eastern cities, and whenever trains looped under the railroad terminal, the picture would shake.
Edwards anchored the program until 1962, when he moved to the CBS News daytime broadcasts and was succeeded by Cronkite on the evening news.
The CBS news correspondent at the time of his retirement anchored the midmorning edition of 'Newsbreak' and the Sunday morning series, 'For Our Times,' which viewed the news from a religious and cultural perspective.
He retired after celebrations marking the 50th anniversary of the 'World News Roundup,' the country's oldest network radio newscast, which premiered on CBS March 13, 1938. He had reported on 'World News Roundup' since joining CBS.
'Douglas Edwards has been a friend and mentor since before I joined CBS News,' Dan Rather said after Edwards' retirement was announced. 'He's a giant in our craft and all of us in television and radio news are indebted to him.'
Howard Stringer, president of CBS News, said, 'Doug will be sorely missed, his accomplishments long treasured.' Gene F. Jankowski, president, CBS-Broadcast Group, called Edwards 'a fine person and a splendid journalist.'
At the time of his death he was married to the former May Hamilton Dunbar. He has three children from a previous marriage.
