ABC News anchor Peter Jennings dies of cancer

Another sad day in America...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Peter Jennings, prime-time anchorman for ABC News for more than two decades, died of lung cancer on Sunday at his home in New York, the network said. He was 67.

I just heard this on TV. That is so sad, I was hoping he was getting better everyday when I would watch ABC news and it would still say with Peter Jennings.... RIP

JEFF d
Elvis fan

First it was Dan Rather who died on the air (so to speak) even though he is still alive, and now this.

I watched many hours of informative material broadcasted by Jennings.

Rest in peace and may God be with his family.

RIP Peter Jennings........

For all you smokers on this MB please take note !

SMOKING KILLS

Did Peter smoke ?

Another sad day in America...

... and in Canada as Mr. Jennings was first and foremost a Canadian.

I heard about this news about 10 minutes after it hit the net last nite...

pretty sad news, but not 1/2 as sad as the 20 year old kid that smacked into a telephone poll here in New Jersey and walked away without a bang and the 15 year old passenger had to get scraped up from in the car cuz they weren't nuthin' left....


sum horrid sh*t right out in front of my boyz crib...

I'm still spooked!


R.I.P. for all the souls of the departed...

Man if you hear about someone having lung cancer you know they are a gonner.

What I think of him most was the Peter Jennings the century program. The special with the Rise...and the Fury. Comparing Martin Luther King and Elvis. When I compared the two almost a year before I got in the hugest arguments. It was like taboo. Then there is the actual comparison on prime time tv. That too me showed a view that was not skewed by pc programming.

R.I.P. Peter Jennings. I am sorry that you had to go in such a horrible way.

Smoking is a messed up habit and that is why I gave up cigarretes. It has been 8 months now and my life has never been better. I have fallen off a couple of times(maybe 6 cancer sticks total), but in the end it just isn't worth it. When I hear proof positive of a fatality...it makes me that much longer before I will ever touch another one.

Another sad day in America...

... and in Canada as Mr. Jennings was first and foremost a Canadian.

I did read that he was an Canadian...not that it matters to me, I find myself considering Canadians some of the best Americans...lol
Funny that Canadians have the best of both worlds, they can love their country and be patriotic at the same time blending in seamlessly with the USA. All the while picking and choosing the parts they want to keep.

Another funny part is how we accept the border crossing of our friends to the North without a wisper, but find the border crossings to our South unacceptable. What a wacky world we live in.

I was not refering to his citizenship as much as the fact that he is an American Institution.

8 months........ATTA BOY GENE!!!!!! Keep it up buddy!!

It's been 3 months for me and so far giving up is the worse thing I did, but I don't wanna do the one thing worse than that which is to start again.

Both my Grandfathers died of lung cancer, and neither of them had ever smoked in their lives.

I'm self employed and where I go to do most of my work is in an environment where most of the others smoke. Had I been employed and not self employed I could have done something about it. As it is I just avoid work as much as possible and this has cost me far more than it ever did to smoke. Over in the UK a pack of 20 cigs costs about $7.50 to give you a comparitive idea.

It was cheaper for me to smoke and I felt healthier even if I wasn't.

Several years ago Peter Jennings made some on the air political comments that I felt were biased and inappropriate for a news anchor. I don't recall what exactly he said, but I remember getting very irritated by his comments. Because of this, I didn't care for him. But that didn't stop me from wishing him a full recovery when it was announced he had lung cancer.

In listening to the many tributes since his passing I have to say that I unfairly dismissed him.

RIP Peter Jennings.

I didn't know Peter Jennings. CNN International aired a tribute yesterday, and the life and legacy instantly impressed me. I wish I would have been able to witness his interesting work, what a gifted and charismatic reporter and classy news anchor.

Another sad day in America...

... and in Canada as Mr. Jennings was first and foremost a Canadian.

I did read that he was an Canadian...not that it matters to me, I find myself considering Canadians some of the best Americans...lol

I thought I had read that Peter had become an American citizen. Is that true? Doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things, but...

Yes, he did become a US citizen (duel citizen?) by 2003, motivated by 9/11, apparently.

It does provide pause for smokers among us. In my family, if you smoke, you die young, so I know all about the pain of this disease and encourage Steve and Genesim to stick to it.

Apparently Jennings was your typical heavy-smoker (looked great with an trench-coat as a "foreign correspondent from London" ) but he finally quit for 20 years....until 9/11. He was on for 24 hours in a row and then the better part of 60 hours, much of which I viewed. During this time, he took up smoking again (looking back, I kind of sensed it) and apparently quit again later.


Genesim is right: Jennings did do some neat comparison of Elvis & MLK.
I also recall another Jennings saying some kind things about Elvis and American southern and roots music during a segment with DJ Nick Spizter. Jennings seemed genuinely enthused over American roots music, apparently also a fan of blues and jazz.

As an aside, the ABC broadcaster who may replace him, Elizabeth Vargas, is the boyfriend of Marc "Walking in Memphis" Cohn, who was car jacked in Denver, and shot in the head the other day, but apparently survived. His song apparently wasn't really about Elvis, but many took it that way. The good news is that he'll apparently be fine.

Last edited by Gregory Nolan Jr. on Wed Aug 10, 2005 6:08 pm, edited 1 time in total.

As an aside, the ABC broacaster who may replace him, Elizabeth Vargas, is the boyfriend of Marc "Walking in Memphis" Cohn, who was car jacked and shot in the head the other day, but apparently survived. His song apparently wasn't really about Elvis, but many took it that way. The good news is that he'll apparently be fine.

Holy cow Greg! I never realized that Elizabeth Vargas was a guy! Or that Marc Cohn was gay!
What's more, I find Elizabeth Vargas attractive!

As an aside, the ABC broacaster who may replace him, Elizabeth Vargas, is the boyfriend of Marc "Walking in Memphis" Cohn, who was car jacked and shot in the head the other day, but apparently survived. His song apparently wasn't really about Elvis, but many took it that way. The good news is that he'll apparently be fine.

Holy cow Greg! I never realized that Elizabeth Vargas was a guy! Or that Marc Cohn was gay!
What's more, I find Elizabeth Vargas attractive!

I'd like to apologize for my joke above. Given the life-threatening nature of the Marc Cohn shooting, and that this was a thread about the passing of Peter Jennings my joke was in poor taste.

For the record Elizabeth Vargas is Marc Cohn's wife. Marc Cohn's manager, Thomas Dube, was grazed by the bullet. (Mr. Dube is no relation to yours truly.)

I can't speak for everyone, Pete, but I didn't see your comment as being tasteless. It wasn't meant to be, and I would guess tha most of us recognize that. I think most of us understand that you are an upstanding person, and wouldn't intentionally do anything to upset anyone.

KHoots -
Thank you for the very kind words! I do hope that everyone understands I wasn't trying to make light of Jennings death or the Cohn shooting incident. My quirky sense of humor just got ahead of my judgment.

No problem, Pete.

Here's a shot of that guy, I mean, "ABC Broadcaster"
a.k.a. Elizabeth Vargas.


My eyes at least tell me that maybe the end of the "voice of God" style
of anchormen isn't a bad thing. She's been quite good in his absence, truth be told.


Has anyone checked out the U.S.
cable TV channels lately?

Maybe it's just because it's summertime, but there are
hours devoted to wealthy, good-looking (usually white) people
who try to kill their spouses or are lost on an island.
So much for the emphasis on hard news after 9/11.
Whether you are left or right this should concern you.

No matter what one thinks of him (apparently some found him
spending too much time getting the Muslim side of the Middle
East conflict), trivialization of the news was something Jennings
fought against, particularly trying to get ABC suits to
devote more time to international coverage
and not celebrities and bimbos.

Last edited by Gregory Nolan Jr. on Thu Aug 11, 2005 5:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.

It's been 3 months for me and so far giving up is the worse thing I did, but I don't wanna do the one thing worse than that which is to start again.

Both my Grandfathers died of lung cancer, and neither of them had ever smoked in their lives.

I'm self employed and where I go to do most of my work is in an environment where most of the others smoke. Had I been employed and not self employed I could have done something about it. As it is I just avoid work as much as possible and this has cost me far more than it ever did to smoke. Over in the UK a pack of 20 cigs costs about $7.50 to give you a comparitive idea.

It was cheaper for me to smoke and I felt healthier even if I wasn't.

Good going Steve!!! It must be hell to be in an environment where everyone else is smoking after you've just quit. That's the trouble with consulting work....you're always foisted into someone elses environment, no matter what strictures you may have placed upon what you deemed unacceptable for yourself.

Have you tried the new laser therapies where they focus a beam upon specific pressure points to alleviate the cravings??My aunt swears by this treatment, and studies seem to validate it as effective. Pretty cheap too, at about $150 .

Elizabeth Vargas, is the boyfriend of Marc "Walking in Memphis" Cohn, who was car jacked in Denver, and shot in the head the other day, but apparently survived. His song apparently wasn't really about Elvis, but many took it that way.

Not surprising many took it that way, given the references to blue suede shows, following the ghost of Elvis up to the gates of Graceland, and a girl waiting for the King in the Jungle Room. Not exclsuively about Elvis perhaps.


I saw a lot of Peter Jennings' broadcasts as we get the American news on cable over here. He was a very capable broadcaster and its sad news.