Edward Murrow

With a name like This I Believe and with the involvement from Edward R. Murrow, you might think that this show was an editorial platform for Murrow. However, it was not an editorial vehicle for Murrow. It was a show about Americans and their beliefs. In another, more cynical time, Murrow and This I Believe would probably be called naive, but with Murrow’s reputation for journalistic integrity, his unapologetic love for America, and the time period, it was a hit. He could see that, after the last war, and with the looming shadow of the Cold War, Americans needed to find themselves again. They needed to remember what they believe. The biggest problem he ran into was top management at his own network. They increasingly tried to control the editorial direction, continually placing yokes on the news division and trying to make sponsors happy. Eventually, out of several shows Murrow was pitching, the brass approved This I Believe. The show was about beliefs. Not religious beliefs but

Murrow’s first involvement with CBS grew out of his NSFA presidency. In 1929, CBS started working with the NSFA to create the CBS University of the Air. The NSFA organized speakers and lessons to appear during the low-rated afternoon hours. In 1930, in his capacity as NSFA president, he also started working with CBS on the show. Murrow made his first radio appearance in September 1930 and, eventually, took over as the program host. He arranged for both international and American speakers like Mahatma Ghandi from London and former President Paul von Hindenburg from Berlin as well as Albert Einstein, Corliss Lamont and many more. Though Murrow eventually left the NSFA, he maintained his contact with CBS eventually going to work as the Director of Talks and Education.

While the beginnings of television started in the 1860s with the first cameras and progressed through the work of many people. However, television as we know it came about in the 1920s. Though TVs were commercially available in the 1920s and 1930s, they were not universally adopted. Like radio, people were not quite sure how to use TV. Entertainment was surely one use but there had to be a way to provide informative programming.

When Murrow came home he continued working in radio and knew nothing about television. Murrow certainly had no interest in television even saying that he wish it was never invented. Eventually, he was offered the opportunity to host a TV version of Hear It Now, along with producer Fred Friendly, called See It Now. Never one to sit back and wait for things to happen, Murrow went out to find the stories he wanted to tell. The See It Now team maintained a dedicated camera crew to film on location instead of relying on the companies that filmed the news reels. In another departure from accepted practice, the Murrow/Friendly team refused to rehearse interviews beforehand. Like in radio, Murrow came in and turned television on its collective ear. The regular American was always essential to Murrow and that is who he wanted to know more about. Plenty of other outlets covered celebrities and politicians, it was the everyday man and woman Murrow wanted the world to know. He also wanted to sho

“Good night and good luck” was Edward R. Murrow’s famous sign off. He ended his reports from Europe that way, implementing it in 1940 on a broadcast from London. In addition to the famous Edward R. Murrow sign off was his sign on for his early reports: “This...is London,” or whatever city he was in at the time. Both of these catch phrases helped make Murrow an icon in broadcasting history. Murrow’s sign off was as famous as that of just about any broadcast journalist.   Other well-known sign off phrases include Walter Kronkite’s “and that’s the way it is,” Paul Harvey’s “Good Day,” and Linda Ellerbe’s “and so it goes.”

Good Night, and Good Luck , the 2005 box office blockbuster, looks at Edward R. Murrow’s epic battle against the commie-hunting Senator, Joseph McCarthy. David Strathairn (The Bourne Ultimatum) played Murrow, while Jeff Daniels and Robert Downey, Jr. also starred. George Clooney wrote and directed, while also playing the role of Fred Friendly. Good Night, and Good Luck   movie is about Murrow’s idealism was nominated for six Oscars and won the 2005 AFI Film Award for AFI Movie of the Year. Edward R. Murrow is the subject of other movies available at video stores and via online video rental services. Edward R. Murrow: The Best of “See it Now”  Edward R. Murrow: The Best of “Person to Person”  Edward R. Murrow: The McCarthy Years ,  These above are all compilations of the famed reporter’s work, while This Reporter and Harvest of Shame are documentaries on his life and career.

On Oct. 15, 1958, Murrow gave a controversial speech that would live on in history for its candid nature, and for its success in dressing down the broadcast journalism industry. It is sometimes called the “wires and lights in a box speech.” Murrow was asked to give the keynote address at the ‘58 Radio-Television News Directors Association convention. He reluctantly agreed, mounted the dais, and proceeded to breath fire, dismantling the industry as lacking in values, not standing up to corporate interests, and betraying the trust of the American people with their watered-down reporting. Early in the speech, Murrow intoned, “If there are any historians about 50 or 100 years from now, and there should be preserved the kinescopes for one week of all three networks, they will find there recorded in black and white, or color, evidence of decadence, escapism, and insulation from the world in which we live.” He later said “I would like television to produce some itching pills rather than t