Goodbye Peter

And another one bites the dust. ( http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050808/ap_on_en_tv/obit_jennings ) Hearing of his lung cancer months ago, hit me more than hearing of his death now. I suppose you could see this coming then, lung cancer kills quickly, so the punched-in-the-gut surprise was then, not now. I'll miss his brains and resolve.

Dan and Tom, I could take or leave. I didn't have the great animosity that seems to ferment in many towards Dan, and Tom, like his replacement, seems nice enough. But Peter. There was one who seemed straight up, who had a worldly intelligence, whose facial expressions after reading a particularly outrageous story seemed neutral but betrayed an impatience with the idiots at work out there. Maybe it was his international flavor, his don't-piss-on-my-head and then-tell-me-it's-raining attitude. I liked the guy, and quite frankly, don't miss the evening news without him. I haven't watched any station much since he's been gone; when the tv is on at 5:30, Madison runs the BBC news at the same time. I find they prioritize the stories better and can go into more detail since there's less fluffy filler. Kind of like a meat and fruit and vegetable meal, minus the sugar and salty pre-processed treats.

Here are some facts pulled from the Star Tribune story: Jennings never completed high school or college, but was educated on the job, you might say. He was picked at 26 to anchor the ABC evening news and debuted on Feb. 1, 1965. (His father was a broadcaster, and Jennings began work on the radio, with a show when he was 9.)

Of his early start with ABC, he was highly criticized and then lost the job at 29. "It was a little ridiculous when you think about it. A twenty-six-year-old trying to compete with Cronkite, Huntley and Brinkley. I was simply unqualified."

Jennings later described the humbling experience as an opportunity, "because I was obliged to figure out who I was and what I really wanted to be." He returned to the anchor desk in 1978, as part of a 3-person team.

From the Star Trib story: He took pride that "World News Tonight," as its name suggested, took a more worldly view than its rivals. Fans responded to his smart, controlled style.

"I have never spent a day in my adult life where I didn't learn something," Jennings told the Saturday Evening Post. "And if there is a born-again quality to me, that's it."
--------
Deaths like these are akin to Carson's, except he had been gone a lot longer in the public eye than Jennings. You don't know these people, but I for one spent an awful lot of time, part of my daily routine, watching him in the 80s and 90s. He was a person, yet very real, in a way our come-and-go media today, in an unstable world, is not. I once heard someone describe Peter Jennings as "arrogant". Huh? I suppose that independent, no bullshit, no fawning style might be taken the wrong way. And for those who would tell me he smoked like a chimney, I'm not shedding any tears here for his death. Just sorry to lose that kind of person -- quality, self made -- in times when you always have to be looking to pop the umbrella because somebody out there's getting ready to take a tinkle.

Jennings is survived by his wife, Kayce Freed, and his two children, Elizabeth, 25, and Christopher, 23. We wish them well, strength like the father.