I was totally surprised in the fall of 1979 when Reese Schon feld asked me to consider the job of financial editor of Cable News Network, then in its formative stage.
I was the financial editor of The Post and a syndicated columnist, with no television experience or aspirations.
As an ink-stained print journalist my entire adult life, I had doubts about the viability of the 24-hour, all-news television network that Schonfeld was putting together for a championship yachtsman named Ted Turner.
But the challenge of putting business and financial news on TV intrigued me. I had long felt that the absence of such coverage from network television was a gaping hole in TV news that was crying to be filled.
So I agreed to talk — and to take a screen test — figuring deep down that that would be the end of it. Besides, many of my friends and journalistic colleagues thought it was a crazy idea.
A few days later, Schonfeld called from Atlanta and said he had received the test and it was fine. When I expressed some doubts, he responded, (-sdq-)What you don(-esq-)t have in the television graces, you make up in knowledgeability, credibility and sincerity.(-edq-)
That was more than 20 years ago, so I guess it worked out. I(-esq-)ve always liked new challenges and my wife Thelma was supportive, so I took the job and began planning for the new adventure.
We started with just four of us, all in New York. (CNN Business News now has more than 300 staffers around the world.) With the help of Mel Tarr, a public relations whiz, I found Lou Dobbs in Seattle and Stuart Varney in San Francisco, and hired them as our anchors. I served as commentator and resident financial guru. And Dan Dorfman was our contributing columnist.
With hardly any rehearsal, 20 years ago this coming week we started (-sdq-)(MD+BO)Moneyline,(-edq-) (MD-BO)the first network television program devoted to business news. We were real pioneers and we won some early plaudits.
Oddly, despite my inexperience in TV, I was too busy to be scared. (-sdq-)Moneyline(-edq-) is still on the air in the same time slot — 7 p.m. — and two years ago the 6:30 half-hour was added as well.
Over the years, we(-esq-)ve added a dozen other programs, plus an entire new network, CNNfn, covering business and financial news. And, of course, we now have a host of worthy competitors. That old gaping hole has really been filled up.
But those pioneering days were still the best.
(MD+IT)Earlier this year, Myron Kandel was named one of the 10 most influential business journalists of the 20th century.(MD-IT)