Chuck Scarborough

Charles Bishop "Chuck" Scarborough III (born November 4, 1943) is an American television journalist and author. Since 1974, he has been the lead male news anchor at WNBC, the New York City flagship station of the NBC Television Network, and has also appeared on NBC News. He currently anchors at 6pm, and 11pm on WNBC.^[2]

Life and career

A native of Pittsburgh, and a graduate of the University of Southern Mississippi, Scarborough served in the United States Air Force and currently has a commercial pilot certificate. His career in television began in Mississippi as a reporter at WLOX-TV in Biloxi and later WDAM-TV in Laurel, before moving to WAGA-TV in Atlanta.

Scarborough's first major market anchoring job came in 1972, at WNAC-TV (now WHDH-TV) in Boston. He was originally hired as part of a two-man anchor team with respected New England journalist Lee Nelson, but was soon made the solo anchor of the station's news broadcasts. In addition to his anchor work, he was called on to host a weekly program called Mass Reaction, in which the public was invited to the studio to question news broadcasters and newsmakers.

In his final broadcast on WNAC-TV, Scarborough ended the newscast with a commentary in which he identified the issue of race as the most important challenge facing Boston. A scant few months later, Boston erupted into racial unrest as the result of a federal court order to end its policy of de facto racial segregation in the public schools. While WNAC had been the perennial trailer among Boston's three VHF television news broadcasts, with Scarborough as anchor the station managed to best its rivals in the 6pm newscast ratings.

Scarborough joined WNBC-TV in March 1974 as sole anchor of its then-new 5:00 PM newscast, NewsCenter 4 (later renamed News 4 New York).^[3][4] Eventually, he became the station's lead anchor at 6pm and 11pm. In 2003, he became the unofficial "dean" of New York-area television news anchors when WABC-TV anchor Bill Beutel retired after 37 years. Eight years later, he surpassed Beutel as the longest-serving English-language news anchor in New York television history. His uninterrupted run behind the anchor desk is second in New York-area television only to Spanish-language WXTV's Rafael Pineda, who started with his station in 1972. For much of his first 20 years with NBC, he occasionally appeared on NBC News and often anchored the network's prime-time news updates.

At WNBC, he has worked alongside Marv Albert, Len Berman, Jack Cafferty, Dr. Frank Field, John Hambrick, Pat Harper, Pia Lindstrom, Michele Marsh, Al Roker, and Tom Snyder, among others.

Scarborough was the host of the syndicated programs Images – A Year in Review and Memories...Then and Now in the late 1980s-early 1990s, and also co-anchored the NBC network documentary series Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow with Maria Shriver and Mary Alice Williams.

Awards

Scarborough has won 36 local Emmy Awards,^[2] and was one of the first inductees into the New York State Broadcasters Association Hall of Fame in 2005. He was inducted alongside Sue Simmons, his co-anchoring partner from 1980 until Simmons' retirement in June 2012. They were together longer than any other anchor team in New York City television history.

Personal life

Scarborough is married to Ellen Ward Scarborough, and was previously married to Anne Ford and Linda Gross. He has two children, Chad and Elizabeth. His daughter Elizabeth has followed in her father's footsteps as a television journalist.^[5][6]

He and his family reside in Stamford, Connecticut.

He is not related to MSNBC anchor Joe Scarborough.

Pop culture

In the 1994 movie The Paper, a flash of the nightly news shows Scarborough giving out a headline which is the focal point of the news report, the paper is reporting on. Also on How to Lose Friends and Alienate People, he was briefly shown on a billboard, likely promoting the WNBC news team. He appeared in The Adjustment Bureau, reporting a story for WNBC on the film's protagonist, David Norris (Matt Damon), and in two episodes of the NBC sitcom Veronica's Closet.

Scarborough and Simmons are mentioned in the Fountains of Wayne song "Traffic & Weather" from their 2007 album of the same title.^[7]

Novels

Scarborough has written three novels:

• Stryker (1978), ISBN 0-02-606920-2.
• The Myrmidon Project (1980), ISBN 0-698-11054-4.
• Aftershock (1991), ISBN 0-517-58014-4.

Aftershock was made into a made for television movie, Aftershock: Earthquake in New York in 1999, airing on the CBS television network.

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Chuck Scarborough.

• Chuck Scarborough at the Internet Movie Database
• Chuck Scarborough's bio at nbcnewyork.com
• "Answers From Chuck Scarborough", The New York Times, February 24, 2010