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Pragmatic Obots Unite

Pragmatic Obots Unite

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Thursday Open Thread: African American Trailblazers Broadcast News

June 14, 2012 by Miranda 163 Comments

Good Morning Obots!

Today, the African American Pioneers series features Carole Simpson.

Born in Chicago, early on Simpson had aspirations to become a “black Lois Lane.” She studied two years at the University of Illinois before she transferred to the University of Michigan, where she earned her bachelor’s degree in journalism in 1962.

In 1970 Simpson was hired as the first female African-American reporter on Chicago’s WMAQ-TV. As a general assignment reporter, she covered a wide range of stories and topics.  Along with her husband and their daughter, Simpson moved to Washington, D.C., in 1974 to begin her career as a reporter for NBC News.

For NBC, Simpson hosted a women’s public affairs program on NBC’s Washington affiliate, WRC-TV. She then moved up to the national network level, first as a substitute anchor for NBC Nightly News and weekend anchor for Newsbreak.  After her work as a secondary reporter for NBC News’ coverage of the 1980 Republican and Democratic conventions, ABC hired her as a general assignment correspondent.
 
In 1988, ABC News, promoted  Simpson to anchor of World News Saturday. Shortly thereafter, Simpson reached a milestone in her career and broke new ground in American broadcast journalism. When Simpson subbed for the vacationing Peter Jennings on Wednesday [August 9, 1989] and again Thursday night, she became the first black woman to anchor a Big Three network newscast during the week. In addition, Simpson continued her hard-hitting coverage of breaking news stories throughout the late 1980s and the 1990s.
 

Newslady  is Carole Simpson’s memoir. Her life is about “firsts. Carole Simpson was the first woman to broadcast radio news in Chicago, the first African American woman to anchor a local newscast in the same city, the first African American woman national network television correspondent, the first African American woman to anchor a national network newscast and the first woman or minority to moderate a presidential debate. In this book she recounts how she endured and conquered sex discrimination and racial prejudice to reach the top ranks of her profession.

No major publishing house wanted to touch the book, according to Simpson, so she went through a self-publishing firm called AuthorHouse. Simpson currently teaches broadcast journalism, public affairs reporting and political communication at Emerson College in Boston.

 

Filed Under: Open Thread Tagged With: African American Trailblazers Broadcast News, Carole Simpson

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