Pine Cone publisher Paul Miller was an assistant foreign news editor for CBS News in New York from to , when Walter Cronkite was the undisputed king of television news, and when 60 Minutes, the brainchild of producer Don Hewitt, was at the beginning of its long reign as the No. Later, Miller was assistant foreign editor at NBC News, and spent four years as that network's bureau chief in Israel. For Miller, the memories were mostly about airplanes crashing on an island in the Atlantic Ocean, a nightclub on fire in Kentucky, and dolphins being slaughtered by Japanese fishermen I WAS just 23 years old when I was suddenly elevated from copy boy to assistant foreign editor at the mighty CBS News, which was something like going from bat boy to shortstop for the New York Yankees.
There were also phones to answer, typewriter ribbons to change, and videotapes to hustle. The newsroom was staffed 24 hours a day, so the hours could be strange. And the starting pay was minimum wage.
But the surroundings were undeniably glamorous and powerful, so even the lowest-level jobs were in great demand and regularly attracted the offspring of American royalty. So did a young man whose parents were Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. And a nephew of John F. Somehow, I managed to get my job without knowing anybody. Fill out a form, politely badger the person you gave it to, knock on doors without an appointment β these are the techniques I used, and the same ones I advise would-be journalists to employ today.
My stint as a copy boy at CBS News headquarters on the west side of Manhattan started early on a Monday morning, after a quick interview with a top editor the previous Friday. And the foreign desk promotion I got a few months later came just as suddenly. The assignment was supposed to be temporary while a more senior foreign editor was on sick leave.
And if I did a good job, it must have been because I had enough sense to heed the words of wisdom some of the old-timers gave me:. The first rule pretty much summed up the guiding ethic of network news in the s and s. While news executives had budgets they were supposed to adhere to, spending guidelines went right out the window when big stories broke.
