Honoring Dick Salant: Library’s Lecture Series Marks 20 Years

The late Dick Salant, a 37-year New Canaan resident and longtime CBS executive who led the network’s news division through nearly all of the 1960s and ‘70s—introducing programs such as “60 Minutes” and “CBS Morning News” along the way, among other monumental feats in broadcast journalism—would have turned 100 this month (he passed in 1993).

This year also marks exactly 20 years since New Canaan Library began running its roughly annual Salant Lectures series, which saw Andy Rooney deliver the first installment and counts among its high-profile speakers Walter Cronkite (whom Salant himself had assigned to anchor the “CBS Evening News” in 1962), Charles Osgood, Tom Brokaw, Brian Williams, Lesley Stahl, Connie Chung, Scott Pelley and, most recently, Ann Curry. At 5 p.m. today, Al Jazeera America President Kate O’Brian will speak as part of the series (register here).

“It’s a very special year,” said Susan LaPerla, the library’s programming director.

“He lived in New Canaan and he made a gift before he passed away in 1993, to start a collection on journalism and the first amendment and ethics in journalism, and then he broadened it to include other broadcast news-type topics and personalities,” LaPerla said.

Salant made his own gift in memory of Eric Sevareid, a mentor who had made his mark as a World War II correspondent for CBS under Edward R. Murrow, and died in 1992.

In 1994, the year following Salant’s passing—and with donations from a group that includes media luminaries such as Katharine Graham, Chung, Cronkite, Dan Rather, Osgood, Charles Kuralt, Williams and Ed Bradley—the library dedicated The Richard Salant Room, where the lectures are held and which houses the collection.

At 5 p.m. today—Sunday, April 27—the library in its Adrian Lamb Room will host the second installment of four planned for this year to mark 20 years in the series.

O’Brian will talk about her cable and satellite news channel’s role in the changing landscape of news media.

It’s a testament to New Canaanites’ sophistication and worldliness—as well as media savvy—that many residents are either already watchers of, or eager to learn more about, Al Jazeera America, LaPerla said.

“People in New Canaan get their news from a variety of sources,” LaPerla said. “When we had Ann Curry here, she was talking about being able to curate the news, which means to go out and across the spectrum of what is being provided and you make your selections of what you want to know and the sources of what you find credible. And I think people are going way beyond the traditional sources. And that’s part of what we are doing this year. Part of what we want to do is to showcase the different ways that people receive news now.”

Whereas Salant and this year’s first speaker in the 20^th anniversary series (there are four planned for this year, as long as the mid-term elections don’t interfere), Ann Curry, both represent broadcast journalism in large measure, O’Brian as a member of a cable and satellite news network brings something different from an industry point of view, LaPerla said.

“Just in terms of who is writing the news for them and who is generating the stories, that’s a different perspective too and I think a lot of people are curious to know more about Al Jazeera, because I don’t think a lot of people do,” LaPerla said.

Register here for the O’Brian talk.

Here’s some more information on O’Brian from a library press release:

“[O’Brian] joined the Al Jazeera America team with 30 years of experience at ABC. In her most recent role as senior vice president of newsgathering operations, O’Brian was responsible for all ABC News’ newsgathering operations, including all ABC News bureaus worldwide, business, law and justice, medical, and investigative units, NewsOne, ABC News Radio and affiliate relations. O’Brian also was general manager of programming for ABC News Radio responsible for editorial content; overseas field producer in Rome and London; producer for World News Tonight with Peter Jennings, both in Washington, D.C. and New York; and manager in talent development. She began as a television desk assistant in New York and joined the staff of This Week with David Brinkley when it launched in 1981. O’Brian has won an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award as part of the This Week with David Brinkley team, an Emmy Award for the 2000 Millennium coverage at ABC News and a George Foster Peabody Award for ABC News’ September 11 coverage.”