Ed Bradley dies at 65.
Ed Bradley of CBS Dies by Louis Hau, Forbes.com
Ed Bradley, the veteran CBS News correspondent, died Thursday of leukemia at the age of 65, CBS reported.
Bradley, who was with the television network for 35 years, was best known for his long tenure as a correspondent for the CBS (nyse: CBS - news - people ) news magazine show 60 Minutes, which he joined in 1981.
In contrast to the confrontational style of his 60 Minutes colleague Mike Wallace, Bradley approached his interviews with sensitivity and empathy, which served him well whether he was speaking with Muhammad Ali, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak or Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, who granted Bradley his only TV interview.
A particularly memorable example of Bradley's deft touch was his 1981 interview with Lena Horne, during which the singer opened up about the pain she endured early in her career trying to succeed in a white-dominated entertainment industry.
The interview snared Bradley an Emmy Award, one of 19 he would eventually win. Bradley also garnered the George Foster Peabody Award, the George Polk Award and the Overseas Press Club Award during his career.
Bradley was a native of Philadelphia, where started his broadcasting career in 1963 as a reporter for WDAS Radio, a focal point for the local African-American community.
Last year, the National Association of Black Journalists honored Bradley with a Lifetime Achievement Award. In his acceptance speech, Bradley recalled how much things had changed for minority journalists during his career.
"It doesn’t seem like it was a lifetime ago when we held the first [NABJ] meetings in New York – just a small band of brothers and sisters new to this business of journalism,'' he said. "There weren’t many of us then but we knew we needed to be together…I look around this room tonight and I can see how much our profession has changed and our numbers have grown…All I have to do is turn on the TV and I can see the progress that has been made.”
More on Ed's untimely passing at:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/SHOWBIZ/TV/11/09/obit.bradley/index.html?section=cnn_latest
Even though our paths may have never converged, I always wanted to be interviewed by Ed Bradley.
ReplyDeleteHe was the consumate reporter: dapper, calm, smooth and unruffled in the presence of all the many people he interviewed.
Maybe if I am lucky, I will be able to see him in the next life.
Then I will be able to have my "interview' with him.
Thanks, God, for sending Ed our way.
He will be sorely missed.
To Ann,
ReplyDeleteEd Bradley is the greatest journalist in the 20th-21st century.
I agree that he will be missed as the media is being more and more consolidated, suppressing many voices.
Steph