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A Cronkite Farewell: Journalists and members of public pay respects to longtime television newsman

AP Photo

Pallbearers carry the casket of longtime newsman Walter Cronkite into New York’s St. Bartholomew’s Church on Park Avenue.

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THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: July 24, 2009

NEW YORK - Walter Cronkite was remembered as a great newsman, sailor, friend and father during yesterday's funeral for the former CBS anchor.

"I was often asked, what he's really like? And I would always answer, "He's just the way you hope he is,"' said Mike Ashford, a Cronkite friend of more than 30 years and one of the speakers.

Another speaker, longtime CBS newsman and 60 Minutes commentator Andy Rooney, recalled meeting Cronkite when they both were in England covering World War II.

"I just feel so terrible about Walter's death that I can hardly say anything," he admitted, and excused himself.

The remarkably intimate, even homey ceremony was witnessed by a near-capacity crowd at the enormous St. Bartholomew's Church in midtown Manhattan, where the Cronkite family has worshipped for years. Cronkite died Friday at the age of 92.

Broadcast journalists -- co-workers, competitors, successors -- were on hand, including Connie Chung, Bob Schieffer, Diane Sawyer, Brian Williams, Dan Rather, Barbara Walters, Charles Gibson, Matt Lauer, Tom Brokaw, Morley Safer and Meredith Vieira.

But there was also room for members of the public to pay their respects.

James Huntsburg and his wife, Sylvia, visiting from Canada, had heard about the ceremony. They took their place in one of the pews. Huntsburg said he grew up watching Cronkite. "I feel blessed to be here," he said, visibly moved.

Cronkite came to be called "the most trusted man in America," and was widely considered the premier TV journalist of his time. He anchored The CBS Evening News from 1962 to1981.

During the service, a jazz band played "When the Saints Go Marching In."

A separate memorial will be held within the next few weeks at New York's Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. Cronkite is to be cremated, and his remains buried next to his wife, Betsy, in the family plot in Kansas City, Mo.