Tom Brokaw, the former longtime anchor and managing editor of NBC Nightly News, will be the next speaker in the Sacerdote Great Names Series at Hamilton. He will speak on Thursday, April 27, at 7:30 p.m. in the Margaret Bundy Scott Field House.
The Sacerdote Series is named in recognition of a significant gift from the family of Alex Sacerdote, a 1994 Hamilton graduate. Brokaw will be the 13th speaker in the series. The lecture will be free and open to the public.
Now the NBC News Special Correspondent, Brokaw has had a distinguished 38-year career at NBC News, including more than 20 years as the former anchor and managing editor of NBC Nightly News. He continues today to approach his work with the same intensity and dedication that marked his early years at the network. In February 2004, Brokaw returned to the Asian subcontinent to report on the challenges Pakistan and Afghanistan face as they continue to fight the war on terror. In addition to securing exclusive interviews with Pakistan president Gen. Pervez Musharraf and Afghan president Hamid Karzai, Brokaw traveled with the Pakistani army to mountainous and barren terrain along the border with Afghanistan as they hunted for Al Qaeda and also reported from Southeastern Afghanistan, the base of the 10th Mountain Division.
In 2003, as the international controversy escalated over the increasing likelihood of war with Iraq, Brokaw traveled to the diplomatic and military hotspots throughout the Middle East and the Gulf. On March 19, 2003, Brokaw was the first U.S. news anchor to report that the war with Iraq had begun, and in April 2003, he landed the first television interview with President Bush after the President declared the end of major combat.
Brokaw also had the first exclusive United States one-on-one interview with Russian President Mikhail Gorbachev, for which he earned an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award and was the first and only anchor to report from the scene the night the Berlin Wall fell. He was also the first American anchor to travel to Tibet to report on human-rights abuses and to conduct an interview with the Dalai Lama.
Brokaw's documentary reporting has been recognized with numerous awards, including the prestigious Peabody award in 2004 for Tom Brokaw Reports: A Question of Fairness, in which he examined the issue of affirmative action through the controversy surrounding the University of Michigan and its affirmative action policy. In 1989, Brokaw was awarded his first Peabody award for To Be An American, a documentary about the American tapestry: who we are, how we got here and what it means to become a new citizen. In 2003, he won an Emmy for Outstanding Interview for America Remembers: 9/11 Air Traffic Controllers. In 1997, Brokaw won another Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award for Excellence in Broadcast Journalism for Why Can't We Live Together, a documentary that examined the hidden realities of racial separation in America's suburbs.
Brokaw's other awards for his journalistic achievements include several Emmy, Overseas Press Club and National Headliner awards. In 2003, NBC Nightly News was honored with the prestigious Edward R. Murrow Award for Best Newscast, representing the program's fourth consecutive win in this category.
The NBC News anchor also has a distinguished record as a political reporter. He has covered every presidential election since 1968 and was NBC's White House correspondent during Watergate (1973 to 1976). From 1984 through 2004, Brokaw anchored all of NBC's political coverage, including primaries, national conventions and election nights, and he has moderated nine primary and/or general election debates.
Complementing his distinguished broadcast journalism career, Brokaw has written articles, essays and commentary for several publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, Newsweek, Time, Sports Illustrated, Life, National Geographic, Outside and Interview.
In 1998, Brokaw became a best selling author with the publication of The Greatest Generation. His other books include The Greatest Generation Speaks (1999); An Album of Memories (2001); and A Long Way from Home (2002).
Brokaw began his journalism career in 1962 at KMTV in Omaha, Nebraska. He anchored the late evening news on Atlanta's WSB-TV in 1965 before joining KNBC-TV in Los Angeles. He was hired by NBC News in 1966 and from 1976 to 1981 he anchored NBC News' Today program.
Previous Great Names at Hamilton speakers include Bill Clinton, Bill Cosby, Rudy Giuliani, Madeleine Albright, Jimmy Carter, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Lady Margaret Thatcher, Colin Powell, Mary Matalin and James Carville, Elie Wiesel and F.W. deKlerk. In 1998, jazz and blues singer/musician B.B. King was the first artist to appear as part of the series.
For updated information, call the Great Names Hotline, 859-4636.
