And that's the way it was...

On this date 50 years ago, Walter Cronkite succeeded Doug Edwards as the anchor (a term coined for Cronkite) of the "CBS Evening News."

The newscast was only 15 minutes, which Uncle Walter found ridiculous. Even when it was expanded to 30 minutes in the fall of 1963, Cronkite still didn't think it was long enough. He later praised the hour-long length of what is now called the "PBS NewsHour."

His first producer was future "60 Minutes" creator Don Hewitt. Cronkite took the title of managing editor. He may have been the "anchor" of the program, but he was a feet-on-the-pavement reporter. Many of his newscasts would be hosted on the road -- in China, in Vietnam, in Paris, wherever news happened. After a few years, "The CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite" had knocked NBC's long-established "The Huntley-Brinkley Report" out of the No. 1 spot in the ratings.

He earned the distinction of being "The Most Trusted Man in America."

One of my earliest memories is watching his sign-off in March 1981. It was, in more ways than one, the end of an era. TV news became vapid, network news bureaus slashed both budgets and reporters, and anchors by and large lost their sophistication and urbanity. (Although Scott Pelley is doing a great job on CBS now, much better than the previous "anchor.")

Cronkite remains a hero and my favorite anchor, although I vehemently disagreed with some of his ideas, particularly about one-world government. He championed the space program, told us what we needed to know, occasionally (and it was occasionally) gave us his opinion, and did it all with an avuncular, engaging presence.

I remember him now, will remember him always, as the heart and soul of the "CBS Evening News."

And that's the way it is for Monday, April 16, 2012. This is Jake Mabe, Shopper-News, goodnight.

'The Death of a President'

Hey there, y'all.

Sorry it's been awhile since I've ducked in here. The last couple of weeks at work have been nuts. It's the busy season for us, too. One of several.

Not too much to report. We had a great Thanksgiving. Hope you did, too.

Saturday night I was feeling well enough to take a jaunt to Johnson City. I hadn't seen Robinella since our wedding and we were overdue for a short and sweet road trip.

So, we went to the Down Home and heard some tunes and detoxed from all the turkey and tryptophan.

I've been neglecting my reading since finishing Tom Brokaw's new book. Tonight after work and a later appointment, I ducked into the Fountain City Branch Library and borrowed William Manchester's "The Death of a President." I thought about it last week when that awful anniversary came and went. Hate to admit it, but I've yet to read it. (Can you believe this one-time best seller is out of print?!)

Manchester writes in a distinctive style that is both anachronistic and charming. I have to keep a dictionary nearby. But I love it. His two books on Churchill are must haves for any student of history and I enjoyed what I read of "American Caesar," Manchester's biography of Douglas MacArthur.

Jenn tells me that sometimes I get submerged in whatever historical anniversary we're bumping up against at the time. Maybe so. This year, I stumbled onto a YouTube series of the CBS broadcast day from Friday, Nov. 22, 1963, beginning with "As the World Turns," which was interrupted about 10 minutes after its 1:30 p.m. (Eastern) start time when Walter Cronkite read the first of the fateful wire dispatches from Dallas.

I watched about 30-some installments of it over the course of a week and finally decided to dig up a copy of Manchester's book. I'll let you know what I think when I'm through.

Here is a link to a 2009 Vanity Fair story that tells the stunning, tragic story behind the book's publication, which was fought by Jackie Kennedy for a time.

Vintage CBS interview debunks Kennedy/Vietnam myth

Here is vintage footage of Walter Cronkite's famous interview with President John Fitzgerald Kennedy on Sept. 2, 1963, for the CBS Evening News.

This debunks the myth that arose after Kennedy's tragic assassination that he favored withdrawal from Vietnam. The segment is particularly poignant when viewed today, given what we know would happen on Nov. 22.

Also, compare this with "interviews" that air these days on various "news programs."

Remembering MLK

Here is the CBS newscast from the night that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated (April 4, 1968). Includes clips from two MLK speeches.

Also, compare this with what passes for "newscasts" today. And notice how parts of President Lyndon Baines Johnson's speech are eerily relevant to our current era.

Nov. 22, 1963

Today is the 47th anniversary of the day that President John Fitzgerald Kennedy was assassinated by LEE HARVEY OSWALD in Dallas, Texas.

I'll get into a diatribe about all these "conspiracy theories" another time, but in remembrance today, here is a link to the first of a fascinating series of YouTube videos that airs the CBS broadcast day for Nov. 22, 1963, beginning with the episode of "As the World Turns" that was being broadcast live at 1:30 p.m. (Eastern), almost the exact moment that Kennedy was shot.

Just to show you how much technology has improved, the reason you only hear Walter Cronkite in the first few announcements is because he was waiting for the CBS news cameras to warm up!

The first video can be found here.

It must have been moonglow...

I've always been fascinated with outer space.

Guess it's that little boy sliver of childhood -- I have that to thank for my love of baseball too -- that never quite goes away. What American child born after 1960 hasn't at one time or another put a big bowl on your head and pretended to be an astronaut, the last American cowboy, touching down in the Sea of Tranquility?

Saw an absolutely fantastic documentary tonight about the biggest of all the NASA heroes --- the Apollo astronauts. "In the Shadow of the Moon" is the story of that special space mission, told in the words of the surviving astronauts themselves.

Well, all except in the words of the guy, the one we all want to hear from, that ever-reclusive Neil Armstrong. It's OK, though, because the other guys -- Buzz Aldrin and Mike Collins among them -- all talk about him. And he's here, sort of, in archival NASA footage. (And, frankly, it adds to Armstrong's mystique that he wouldn't participate. Legends don't do such things.)

It's that archival footage, though, that makes this documentary quite special. You see a shot of Armstrong's famous one small step from an angle you've never seen before. And there are no CGI enhancements, no computer-generated images here. This is the real thing, baby, warts and all.

The film does a nice job of placing the Apollo program -- and its famous July 1969 Apollo 11 landing -- into historical perspective. We see a fresh-faced John F. Kennedy, promising the nation we'd land an astronaut on the moon by the end of the decade. Vietnam, protests, unrest -- all of that is here -- peppered around the big mission.

And, yes, it still captures the imagination. Maybe it's because we've not been back to the moon since '72. Maybe it's because space really is the final frontier, the one last place we've never been. Probably it's because this mission, now nearly 40 years old, is still better than anything George Lucas or Gene Roddenberry ever dreamed up.

The darn thing even turns out to be quite moving, when the various Apollo crew members talk of how insignificant the earth seems way out there in the blue -- and how precious it is to come home to.

You learn, one of them says, that we're wasting our most precious resource. "We should be concerned about (conserving the earth) for our kids and grandkids," one of them says. "And instead what are we worried about? The price of a gallon of gas."

If there's anything to criticize in this fine film, it's that you are left wanting more. Apollo 11 dominates the narrative (complete with CBS News footage of a spellbound Walter Cronkite calling the action that July 20). The movie hurries over the troubled Apollo 13 mission and doesn't really tell us what happened on the rest of the moon trips.

The striking thing about this movie is seeing how wowed the rest of the world was at America's little moon landing. Mike Collins says the most used word he heard on the around-the-world trip that he, Aldrin and Armstrong made after returning home, was "we."

We did that. All of us. Neil, Buzz and Mike took our hopes and dreams and fears up there with them.

"I always trusted the Americans," a French woman said after the landing. "I knew they'd get it right."

When on earth would you hear that today?

"In the Shadow of the Moon" is an important slice of history. It stirs up the star spangled optimism that this country used to be known for, and could be again. It makes me want to take a weekend off and finally read "First Man," James R. Hansen's 2005 authorized biography of Armstrong.

But mostly it reminds me of the wonderful unknown that lies way out yonder somewhere, and leads me to feel certain that someday, somehow, another generation's Neil, Buzz and Mike will fly out there and touch that undiscovered country.

Because that's simply what Americans do.

"In the Shadow of the Moon" is now playing at Regal CinemaArt Downtown West 8. It is rated PG.