The "Unelected Elite"

Hundreds of men and women are responsible for the presentation of TV news, and any selection of an "elite" (in Spiro Agnew's phrase) is necessarily arbitrary. Still, a few men stand out at the top of the profession, including the twelve, some familiar and some not, who are identified below:

BRINKLEY, David, 49, NBC News correspondent. Born in Wilmington, N.C., dropped out of high school but took courses at University of North Carolina and Vanderbilt University. Reporter for Wilmington Star-News, 1938-41. Bureau manager in South for United Press Associations, 1941-43. Became NBC Washington correspondent, 1943; in 1956 was teamed with Huntley. Separated, three children.

CRONKITE, Walter, 53, managing editor of CBS News and news analyst. Born in St. Joseph, Mo., attended the University of Texas. War correspondent for United Press, 1942-45, and Chief U.P. correspondent at Nuremberg Trials; head of U.P. Moscow bureau, 1946-48. Correspondent CBS-TV news since 1950. Married, three children.

FRANK, Reuven, 48, president of NBC News. Born in Montreal, graduated from the City College of New York, 1942 (B.S.); Columbia, 1947 (M.S.). Reporter, Newark Evening News, 1947-49; night city editor, 1949-50. Joined NBC News in 1950; news editor, Camel News Caravan, 1951-54; producer, political convention coverage, 1956, 1960 and 1964; producer Huntley-Brinkley Report, 1956-62 and 1963-65. Married, two sons. Registered Democrat.

HUNTLEY, Chester (Chet), 57, NBC-News correspondent. Born in Cardwell, Mont., graduated from the University of Washington, 1934 (B.A.). Began radio newscasting with KPCB Seattle in 1934. Joined NBC in 1955, and within a year was teamed from New York with Brinkley in Washington. Married, two children. Registered as Independent.

LOWER, Elmer W., 56, president of ABC News. Born in Kansas City, Mo., graduated from University of Missouri School of Journalism, 1933; Columbia University, 1958 (M.A.). Reporter on the Louisville Herald-Post and Flint (Mich.) Journal and a United Press editor in Washington, D.C. Foreign correspondent, LIFE, 1944-51. CBS News, Washington and New York, 1953-59; vice president of NBC News, 1959-63. Married, two sons. Registered Independent.

MIDGLEY, Leslie, 54, CBS executive producer. Born in Salt Lake City, attended University of Utah. City editor, Salt Lake City Deseret News, 1935-40; night editor, New York Herald-Tribune Paris edition, 1944-49; associate editor, Collier's, 1949; managing editor, Look, 1952-54; producer, CBS News from 1954. Married (to Betty Furness), three children. Registered Democrat.

REYNOLDS, Frank, 45, ABC News analyst. Born in East Chicago, Ind., attended Indiana University and Wabash College. Anchor man at WBKB-TV, Chicago, 1950; writer-producer-reporter at WBBM-CBS, Chicago, 1951-63. ABC Chicago correspondent, 1963-65, and ABC White House correspondent, 1965-68. Married, five sons.

SALANT, Richard S., 55, president of CBS News. Born in New York City, graduated from Harvard, 1935 (A.B.) and Harvard Law School, 1938 (LL.B.). Attorney for U.S. Government, 1938-43, serving on National Labor Relations Board, with the Solicitor General and as acting director of the Attorney General's Committee on Administrative Procedure. Associate of law firm of Rosenman Goldmark, Colin & Kaye, 1946-48; partner, 1948-52. Vice president of CBS, 1952-61; named director of CBS and president of CBS News, 1961. Married, five children.

SEVAREID, (Arnold) Eric, 56, CBS News analyst. Born in Velva, N. Dak., graduated from University of Minnesota, 1935 (A.B.). Reporter on Minneapolis Star, 1936-37; city editor, Paris edition of the New York Herald-Tribune, 1938-39. Became CBS European correspondent, 1939; as U.S. war correspondent, broadcast French capitulation from Tours and Bordeaux; CBS Washington bureau, 1941-43 and 1946-59. Author of five books. Divorced, two children.

SMITH, Howard K., 55, ABC News analyst. Born in Ferriday, La., graduated from Tulane University, 1936 (B.A.); Rhodes scholar at Oxford, 1937. Correspondent in London for United Press, 1939; CBS Berlin correspondent, 1941. War correspondent, 1944-45. Chief European correspondent of CBS in London, 1946-57. CBS Washington correspondent, 1957-61; CBS chief correspondent and general manager, 1961-62. Joined ABC in 1962. Author of three books. Married, two children.

WESTFELDT, Wallace, 46, executive producer of Huntley-Brinkley. Born in New Orleans, graduated from the University of the South, 1947 (B.A.). TIME correspondent, 1950 and 1952; reporter, Nashville Tennessean, 1953-61. Associate producer, NBC, 1961; writer for Huntley-Brinkley, 1963; associate producer in Washington, 1967. Married, one daughter.

WESTIN, Avram (Av) Robert, 40, ABC executive producer. Born in New York City, graduated from New York University, 1949 (B.A.); Columbia, 1958 (M.A.). CBS News writer-reporter, 1950-53; producerdirector, 1958-67. Executive producer CBS News, 1965-67; executive director of Public Broadcasting Laboratory, 1967-69. Divorced, one son. An Independent.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.