Legendary PBS anchor Robert McNeil died Friday at the age of 93, his family confirmed, according to multiple reports.
Mr. McNeil died of natural causes at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, his daughter said. according to To the Associated Press. He is remembered for his decades-long career in public news broadcasting and for co-creating and co-hosting the “McNeil-Lehrer News Hour” on PBS with the late Jim Lehrer in the 1970s.
He became famous for his coverage of the Senate Watergate hearings during the administration of former President Richard Nixon. He also started a half-hour broadcast on PBS called “The Robert McNeil Report,” which later became the McNeil-Lehrer Report, in 1975 with Lehrer, who served as Washington correspondent.
The show was renamed the McNeil-Lehrer News Hour in 1983 and became the first one-hour news broadcast in the United States, according to the Associated Press. The show continues to air today with Jeff Bennett and Amna Nawaz.
Nawaz mourned McNeil’s death in a statement Friday.
“We lost a member of our @NewsHour A family, and journalism, has lost a giant.my heart is with my family and friends [Robert] Mr. McNeil, co-founder and longtime co-anchor of the NewsHour. His extraordinary legacy lives on in the work we do today,” Nawaz said.
lost our member @NewsHour A family, and journalism, has lost a giant.
My thoughts are with the family and friends of NewsHour co-founder and longtime co-anchor Robin McNeil.
His extraordinary legacy lives on in the work we do today. https://t.co/LXyYhQnXBa
— Amna (@IAmAmnaNawaz) April 12, 2024
According to the newspaper, McNeil left the show in 1995 to become a full-time writer. Lehrer, who passed away in 2020, served as the show’s host until 2009. (Related: Former CBS anchor Charles Osgood dies at 91)
The co-hosts started the show to compete with the style and content of ABC, CBS and NBC, the paper said.
“There’s no need to sell the news,” McNeil told the Chicago Tribune in 1983. What is missing (at 22 minutes) is context, sometimes balance, and consideration of the questions raised by specific events. ”
He hosted a six-night PBS series in 2007 entitled “America at the Crossroads,” about the challenges facing the United States after 9/11.
McNeil was born in Montreal in 1931 and graduated from Carleton University in Ottawa in 1955. He eventually moved to London and began his journalism career at Reuters. He later became a foreign correspondent for the NBC channel in London.
According to the newspaper, he moved to NBC’s Washington bureau in 1963, where he covered White House and civil rights issues. He covered the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy and the 1964 presidential campaign of his successor Lyndon Johnson and Republican opponent Barry Goldwater.
He later became the New York anchor for NBC’s first half-hour weekend network broadcast, The Shelagh McNeil Report, and worked on several documentaries. He then worked at BBC News, and in 1971 he joined PBS.
