Barbara Walters’ Six Decades in Broadcasting

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Barbara Walters is known for her brand of “personality journalism” and for her “scoop” interviews. Walters is a part-time host of the daytime talk show The View, of which she also is co-creator and the co-executive producer.

Barbara Walters first became known as a television personality when she began as a writer and segment producer of “women’s interest stories” on the morning NBC News program The Today Show, where she worked with host Hugh Downs back in 1962.

  

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Barbara Walters is also known for her years on the ABC News Magazine 20/20 where she reunited with former Today Show host Hugh Downs in 1979. Back in 1996, Barbara Walters was also ranked #34 on the TV Guide “50 Greatest TV Stars of All Time”.

Throughout her career at ABC, Barbara Walters has appeared on ABC news specials as a commentator, including presidential inaugurations and the coverage of 9/11. She was also chosen to be the moderator for the third and final debate between candidates Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford, held on the campus of the College of William and Mary at Phi Beta Kappa Memorial Hall in Williamsburg, Virginia, during the 1976 Presidential election.

According to the Denver Post, in 1976, Barbara Walters became the first TV news anchor to make $1 million. In November 1977, she achieved a joint interview with Egypt’s President, Anwar Al Sadat, and Israel’s Prime Minister, Menachem Begin. According to the New York Times, when she went mano a mano with Walter Cronkite to interview both world leaders, at the end of Cronkite’s interview he is clearly heard saying: “Did Barbara get anything I didn’t get?” The Denver Post reported that, Barbara Walter’s 1999 sit down with Monica Lewinsky set a ratings record for a news program. On September 21, 2009, Barbara Walters was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 30th Annual News and Documentary Emmy Awards at New York City’s Lincoln Center.

Now, her career spanning six decades in broadcasting will be celebrated as Barbara Walters plans to sign off after six decades, according to the Denver Post, Walters’s signs off of “The View” on Friday at 10 a.m. on KMGH.

According to the Daily News, Barbara Walters neither cried nor said “Goodbye” Thursday afternoon as she taped her final co-hosting episode of “The View.” The episode will air at 11 a.m. Friday on ABC with special guests Oprah Winfrey and former Secretary of State  Hillary Rodham Clinton to pay surprise visits to Barbara Walters as well as her long time friend, actor Michael Douglas.

Image credit: www.tmz.com