:
For the actor, see Dan ShorDaniel Louis Schorr (born
August 31,
1916) is an American
journalist who has covered the world for more than 60 years. He is now a Senior News Analyst for
National Public Radio (NPR). Schorr has won three
Emmy Awards for his television journalism.
Biography
Early life
Schorr was born in the
Bronx,
New York City, the son of
Russian
Jewish immigrants Tillie Godiner and Gedaliah Tchornemoretz. He began his journalism career at the age of twelve, when he came upon a woman who had jumped or fallen from the roof of his apartment building. After calling the police, he phoned the
Bronx Home News and was paid $5 for his information.
He attended
DeWitt Clinton High School in the West
Bronx, where he worked on the
Clinton News, the school paper. He graduated from
City College of New York in 1939 while working for the
Jewish Daily Bulletin. During
World War II, Schorr served in
Army Intelligence at
Camp Polk,
Louisiana, and at
Fort Sam Houston,
Texas.
In January 1967, he married
Lisbeth Bamberger, a graduate of the
University of California, Berkeley.
Journalism during the Cold War
Following several years as a
stringer, in 1953 he joined
CBS News as one of the recruits of
Edward R. Murrow (becoming part of the later generation of
Murrow's Boys). In 1955, with the post-
Stalin thaw in the
Soviet Union, he received accreditation to open a CBS bureau in
Moscow. In June 1957, he obtained an exclusive interview with
Nikita Khrushchev, the Soviet Communist party chief. It aired on CBS's
Face the Nation, Schorr's first television interview. Schorr left the Soviet Union later that year, because of Soviet censorship laws. When he applied for a new visa, it was denied by the Soviets.
In January 1962, he aired the first examination of everyday life under
communism in
East Germany,
The Land Beyond the Wall: Three Weeks in a German City, which
The New York Times called a "journalistic coup". After agreeing not to foster "propaganda" for the
United States, Schorr was granted the rights to conduct the interviews in the city of
Rostock. By airing everyday life, Schorr painted a picture of the necessity for a Communist state to seal itself off from the West in order to survive.
CBS executives were not amused when Schorr reported—incorrectly—that
Barry Goldwater was said to "travel to Germany to join-up with the right-wing there," and visit "Hitler's one-time stomping ground" in
Berchtesgaden, immediately after he became the Republican nominee for president. For obvious reasons, this did not fare well with Goldwater, who demanded an apology for the "CBS conspiracy" against his campaign for president.
Schorr took a close journalistic interest in the career of
Vice President of the United States Hubert Humphrey.
The 1970s
Schorr attracted the anger of the
Nixon White House. In 1971, after a dispute with White House aides, Schorr's friends, neighbors, and co-workers were questioned by the
FBI about his habits. They were told that Schorr was under consideration for a high-level position in the environmental area. Schorr knew nothing about it. Later, during the
Watergate hearings, it was revealed that Nixon aides had drawn up what became known as
Nixon's Enemies List, and Daniel Schorr was on that list. Famously, Schorr read the list aloud on live TV, surprised to be reading his own name in that context. Schorr won
Emmys for news reporting in 1972, 1973, and 1974.
Schorr provoked intense controversy in 1976 when he received and made public the contents of the secret
Pike Committee report on illegal
CIA and FBI activities. Called to testify before
Congress, he refused to identify his source on
First Amendment grounds, risking imprisonment. This did not mollify CBS executives, and Schorr ultimately resigned from his position at CBS in September 1976.
On
May 14,
2006, on NPR's
Weekend Edition, Schorr mentioned a meeting at the White House that took place with colleague
A. M. Rosenthal and president Gerald Ford. Ford mentioned that the
Rockefeller Commission had access to various CIA documents, including those referring to political assassinations. Although scolded at first for his television report by former CIA director
Richard Helms, Schorr was vindicated by the text of the
Pike Committee, which he obtained from an undisclosed source and leaked to
The Village Voice.
Career as an elder statesman of journalism
In 1979, Schorr was among the first hired by
Ted Turner and
Reese Schoenfeld to deliver commentary and news analysis on the fledgling Cable News Network (
CNN). His contract was not renewed in 1985, one of the two times he stated he was "fired". He then took the position that he currently holds, as Senior News Analyst at NPR. In that position, he regularly comments on current events for programs including
All Things Considered and
Weekend Edition. He also wrote a column for the
Christian Science Monitor for several decades.
In 1994, Schorr narrated the TV miniseries,
Watergate. In the late 1990s, he appeared briefly as a newscaster in three Hollywood movies;
The Game,
The Net, and
The Siege. In the 1997 film
The Game starring
Michael Douglas, Schorr spoke to the main character through his television. On NPR when asked if the media were biased to liberals and to Democrats, he said,"We only give the public what they want to hear!"
Schorr was elected to the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2002.
Other work
Though by no means a fan of
rock music, Schorr became friends with composer
Frank Zappa after the latter contacted him, asking for help with a
voter-registration drive. Schorr made an appearance with Zappa on
February 10,
1988, where he sang "
It Ain't Necessarily So" and "
Summertime". Schorr delivered the eulogy on NPR after Zappa's untimely death on
December 4,
1993; he professed not to understand Zappa's lengthy discourses on
music theory, but he found a kindred spirit—a serious man with a commitment to
free speech.
When Schorr met
Richard Nixon several years after his illegal investigation, Nixon responded to Schorr's introduction by saying, "Dan Schorr, damn near hired you once!"
Awards
- Emmy Award for "for outstanding achievement within a regularly scheduled news program," 1972, 1973, and 1974.
- Edward R. Murrow Award for Lifetime Achievement in Broadcasting, 2002.
Books by Daniel Schorr
- (2007) Come to Think of It: Notes on the Turn of the Millennium . Viking Adult. ISBN 0670018732.
- (2005) The Senate Watergate Report. Carroll & Graf. ISBN 0-7867-1709-2.
- (2002) Staying Tuned: A Life in Journalism. Washington Square Press. ISBN 0-671-02088-9.
- (1998) Forgive Us Our Press Passes, Selected Works (1972-1998). O'Brien Center for Scholarly Pubns. ISBN 0-9626954-6-7.
- (1978) Clearing The Air. Berkley. ISBN 0-425-03903-X.
- (1970) Don't Get Sick in America. Aurora Publishers. ISBN 0-87695-103-5.
