Arnold Eric Sevareid (November 26, 1912 – July 9, 1992) was an American author and CBS news journalist from 1939 to 1977. He was one of a group of elite war correspondents who were hired by CBS newsman Edward R. Murrow and nicknamed " Murrow's Boys." Sevareid was the first to report the Fall of Paris in 1940, when the city was captured by German forces during World War II. Sevareid followed in Murrow's footsteps as a commentator on the

CBS Evening News The ''CBS Evening News'' is the flagship evening television news program of CBS News, the news division of the CBS television network in the United States. The ''CBS Evening News'' is a daily evening broadcast featuring news reports, feature st ...

for thirteen years, for which he was recognized with Emmy and Peabody Awards.

Early life

Sevareid was born in central

North Dakota North Dakota () is a U.S. state in the Upper Midwest, named after the indigenous Dakota Sioux. North Dakota is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba to the north and by the U.S. states of Minnesota to the east, ...

at Velva to Alfred Eric and Clara Pauline Elizabeth Sevareid (née Hougen). After the failure of the bank in Velva in 1925, his family moved to nearby

Minot Minot ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Ward County, North Dakota, United States, in the state's north-central region. It is most widely known for the Air Force base approximately north of the city. With a population of 48,377 at the ...

, and then to

Minneapolis Minneapolis () is the largest city in Minnesota, United States, and the county seat of Hennepin County. The city is abundant in water, with thirteen lakes, wetlands, the Mississippi River, creeks and waterfalls. Minneapolis has its origin ...

Minnesota Minnesota () is a state in the upper midwestern region of the United States. It is the 12th largest U.S. state in area and the 22nd most populous, with over 5.75 million residents. Minnesota is home to western prairies, now given over t ...

, settling on 30th Avenue North. He attended Central High School in Minneapolis. Sevareid graduated from the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public land-grant research university in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States. ...

in 1935. A descendant of Norwegian immigrants, he preserved a strong bond with Norway throughout his life. Sevareid was adventurous from a young age; several days after he graduated from Central High School in 1930, he and his friend Walter Port embarked on an expedition sponsored by the '' Minneapolis Star'', from Minneapolis to

York Factory York Factory was a settlement and Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) factory (trading post) located on the southwestern shore of Hudson Bay in northeastern Manitoba, Canada, at the mouth of the Hayes River, approximately south-southeast of Churchill. ...

, on

Hudson Bay Hudson Bay ( crj, text=ᐐᓂᐯᒄ, translit=Wînipekw; crl, text=ᐐᓂᐹᒄ, translit=Wînipâkw; iu, text=ᑲᖏᖅᓱᐊᓗᒃ ᐃᓗᐊ, translit=Kangiqsualuk ilua or iu, text=ᑕᓯᐅᔭᕐᔪᐊᖅ, translit=Tasiujarjuaq; french: b ...

. They canoed up the

Minnesota River The Minnesota River ( dak, Mnísota Wakpá) is a tributary of the Mississippi River, approximately 332 miles (534 km) long, in the U.S. state of Minnesota. It drains a watershed of in Minnesota and about in South Dakota and Iowa. It ris ...

and its tributary, the Little Minnesota River, to Browns Valley,

portage Portage or portaging (Canada: ; ) is the practice of carrying water craft or cargo over land, either around an obstacle in a river, or between two bodies of water. A path where items are regularly carried between bodies of water is also called a ...

d to Lake Traverse, and descended the Bois des Sioux River to the

Red River of the North The Red River (french: rivière Rouge or ) is a river in the north-central United States and central Canada. Originating at the confluence of the Bois de Sioux and Otter Tail rivers between the U.S. states of Minnesota and North Dakota, it fl ...

, which led to

Lake Winnipeg Lake Winnipeg (french: Lac Winnipeg, oj, ᐑᓂᐸᑲᒥᐠᓴᑯ˙ᑯᐣ, italics=no, Weenipagamiksaguygun) is a very large, relatively shallow lake in North America, in the province of Manitoba, Canada. Its southern end is about north of ...

. They then went down the

Nelson River The Nelson River is a river of north-central North America, in the Canadian province of Manitoba. The river drains Lake Winnipeg and runs before it ends in Hudson Bay. Its full length (including the Saskatchewan River and Bow River) is , i ...

, Gods River, and

Hayes River The Hayes River is a river in Northern Manitoba, Canada, that flows from Molson Lake to Hudson Bay at York Factory. It was historically an important river in the development of Canada and is now a Canadian Heritage River and the longest natura ...

, a trip of . Sevareid's book, ''

Canoeing with the Cree ''Canoeing with the Cree'' is a 1935 book by journalist Eric Sevareid, recounting a canoe trip that he and friend Walter Port embarked on in 1930. History and title Prior to the trip, which took place during the summer of 1930 and was sponsored ...

'' (1935), was the result of this canoe trip and is still in print.

Early career

At age 18, Sevareid entered journalism as a reporter for the ''

Minneapolis Journal The ''Star Tribune'' is the largest newspaper in Minnesota. It originated as the ''Minneapolis Tribune'' in 1867 and the competing ''Minneapolis Daily Star'' in 1920. During the 1930s and 1940s, Minneapolis's competing newspapers were consolida ...

'' while he was a student at the

in political science. He continued his studies abroad, first in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

and then in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...

at the Sorbonne University, where he also worked as an editor for

United Press United Press International (UPI) is an American international news agency whose newswires, photo, news film, and audio services provided news material to thousands of newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations for most of the 20t ...

. Sevareid then became city editor of the '' Paris Herald Tribune'', and later joined CBS as a foreign correspondent based in Paris. Sevareid broadcast the Fall of Paris and followed the French government from there to

Bordeaux Bordeaux ( , ; Gascon oc, Bordèu ; eu, Bordele; it, Bordò; es, Burdeos) is a port city on the river Garonne in the Gironde department, Southwestern France. It is the capital of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, as well as the prefectu ...

and then

Vichy Vichy (, ; ; oc, Vichèi, link=no, ) is a city in the Allier department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of central France, in the historic province of Bourbonnais. It is a spa and resort town and in World War II was the capital of ...

before he left France for London and later Washington, D.C. He was appointed as CBS's Washington bureau chief in July 1942. He wrote about the Plains influence on his life in his early memoir, ''Not So Wild A Dream'' (1946). The book is still in print and covers his life in Velva, his family, the Hudson Bay trip, his hitchhiking around the U.S., mining in the

Sierra Nevada The Sierra Nevada () is a mountain range in the Western United States, between the Central Valley of California and the Great Basin. The vast majority of the range lies in the state of California, although the Carson Range spur lies primar ...

, the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

years, his early journalism, and (especially) his experiences in World War II.

Wartime reporting

Relationship with Edward Murrow

Sevareid's work during World War II, with

Edward Murrow Edward Roscoe Murrow (born Egbert Roscoe Murrow; April 25, 1908 – April 27, 1965) was an American broadcast journalist and war correspondent. He first gained prominence during World War II with a series of live radio broadcasts from Europe f ...

as one of the original Murrow's Boys, was at the forefront of broadcasting. In 1940, he was the first to report on the Fall of France. Shortly afterward, he joined Murrow to report on the

Battle of Britain The Battle of Britain, also known as the Air Battle for England (german: die Luftschlacht um England), was a military campaign of the Second World War, in which the Royal Air Force (RAF) and the Fleet Air Arm (FAA) of the Royal Navy defende ...

. Later, Sevareid would refer fondly to the early years working with Murrow: "We were like a young band of brothers in those early radio days with Murrow." In his final broadcast with CBS, in 1977, he would call Murrow the man who "invented me."Sevareid, Eric
Museum of Broadcast Communications.

Rescue in Burma

On August 2, 1943, Sevareid was on board a Curtiss-Wright C-46 Commando that, having taken off from

Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area, the List of countries and dependencies by population, second-most populous ...

, developed engine trouble over

Burma Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John C. Wells, Joh ...

while it was on a Hump airlift mission. He grabbed a bottle of Carew's gin before he parachuted out of the plane. The

U.S. Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War ...

formed a search and rescue team to bring the group out from behind enemy lines. The operatives parachuted in, located the party, and evacuated them safely to

, for which

John Paton Davies Jr. John Paton Davies Jr. (April 6, 1908 – December 23, 1999) was an American diplomat and Medal of Freedom recipient. He was one of the China Hands, whose careers in the Foreign Service were ended by McCarthyism and the reaction to the loss ...

later won the Medal of Freedom. Davies was a U.S. diplomat who, having been a passenger himself, initially led the group away from the crash site and out of harm's way before the rescuers arrived.

Yugoslavia

In Yugoslavia, Sevareid later reported on

Josip Broz Tito Josip Broz ( sh-Cyrl, Јосип Броз, ; 7 May 1892 – 4 May 1980), commonly known as Tito (; sh-Cyrl, Тито, links=no, ), was a Yugoslav communist revolutionary and statesman, serving in various positions from 1943 until his death ...

Yugoslav Partisans The Yugoslav Partisans,Serbo-Croatian, Macedonian, Slovene: , or the National Liberation Army, sh-Latn-Cyrl, Narodnooslobodilačka vojska (NOV), Народноослободилачка војска (НОВ); mk, Народноослобод� ...

Later career

Ronald Reagan and group at 1982 Christmas in Washington taping

After the war, Sevareid continued to work for CBS. He had begun his own program, ''Eric Sevareid and the News'', on June 27, 1942, on CBS; it ran for five minutes, starting at 8:55 ( ET) on Saturdays and Sundays. In 1946, he reported on the founding of the UN and then penne
''Not So Wild a Dream''
(

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou, MU, or Missouri) is a public land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus University of Missouri System. MU was founded in ...

Press, 1946). The book, whose title comes from part of the closing passage of Norman Corwin's radio play "On a Note of Triumph," appeared in eleven printings and became one of the primary sources on the lives of the generation of Americans who had lived through the Great Depression, only to confront the horrors of World War II. In the 1976 edition of the book, Sevareid wrote, "It was a lucky stroke of timing to have been born and lived as an American in this last generation. It was good fortune to be a journalist in Washington, now the single news headquarters in the world since

ancient Rome In modern historiography, ancient Rome refers to Roman people, Roman civilisation from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom ...

. But we are not Rome; the world is too big, too varied." Sevareid always considered himself a writer first and often felt uneasy behind a microphone and even less comfortable on television. Nonetheless, he worked extensively for CBS News on television for decades after the war. During the middle and the end of 1950s, Sevareid found himself on television as the host and science reporter of CBS's ''Conquest''. He also served as the head of the CBS Washington bureau from 1946 to 1954 and was one of the early critics of

Joseph McCarthy Joseph Raymond McCarthy (November 14, 1908 – May 2, 1957) was an American politician who served as a Republican United States Senate, U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957. Beginning in 1950, McCarth ...

's anticommunism tactics.

Investigated by FBI

Internal FBI documents declassified in 1996 show that the agency took an active interest in Sevareid's reporting and activities in the 1940s and the early 1950s. A March 1953 document, "Security Information", is one of several to chronicle Sevareid's activities during the 1940s. It refers to unsubstantiated reports that Sevareid, while he was attending the

in 1941, was alleged to have associated with

communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, ...

s. The files also alleged that while working for the school newspaper at the university, Sevareid participated in an active campaign against the

ROTC The Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC ( or )) is a group of college- and university-based officer-training programs for training commissioned officers of the United States Armed Forces. Overview While ROTC graduate officers serve in al ...

. The files also noted his involvement in an awards banquet held by the

Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee (JAFRC) was a nonprofit organization to provide humanitarian aid to refugees of the Spanish Civil War. History In 1941, the Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee was formed by Lincoln Battalion veterans of t ...

, which had been designated a communist organization by Executive Order 9835. The files note a May 17, 1945, report in the ''Daily People's World'', which stated Sevareid was a scheduled speaker at the Committee's banquet. The FBI called the '' Daily People's World'' a West Coast communist newspaper and claimed that Sevareid was identified as a radio commentator in its reports. Other information in the FBI files noted a May 19, 1945 "newspapermen's forum," "The Free Press," was held at the California Labor School, and Sevareid participated. In two separate 1948 reports, Attorney General Tom C. Clark called the California Labor School "a subversive and Communist organization." The files included information that Sevareid's name was listed as one of those who was willing to raise funds to help support Hollywood celebrities appearing before the House Committee on Un-American Activities in 1947. The information received by the FBI about Sevareid's purported Communist activity was provided by "a representative of another governmental agency" and was never confirmed by investigations.FBI files
Arnold Eric Sevareid. The information contained in the bureau's files was circulated during March 1953 while Sevareid anchored a CBS news program, ''A Report to the Nation''. The FBI was specifically interested in his March 8 broadcast in which he interviewed Harold Stassen, Director for the

Mutual Security Agency The Mutual Security Agency (1951–1953) was a US agency to strengthen European allies of World War II through military assistance and economic recovery. History The Mutual Security Agency was established by the passing of the Mutual Security A ...

. The FBI developed information that documented what they alleged was his "disloyal" activities. By April 1953, the FBI documents show that the bureau found no reason to open a more extensive investigation into Sevareid's activities.

European correspondent

Sevareid wound up the 1950s as CBS's roving European correspondent from 1959 to 1961. He contributed stories to ''

CBS Reports ''CBS Reports'' is the umbrella title used for documentaries by CBS News which aired starting in 1959 through the 1990s. The series sometimes aired as a wheel series rotating with ''60 Minutes'' (or other similar CBS News series), as a series of it ...

'' during that time and served as moderator on a number of CBS series such as ''Town Meeting of the World'', ''The Great Challenge'', ''Where We Stand'', and ''Years of Crisis''. Sevareid also appeared in or on CBS coverage of every presidential election from 1948 to 1976, the year before his retirement.

Final interview with Adlai Stevenson

One of Sevareid's biggest scoops from this time period was his 1965 exclusive interview with

Adlai Stevenson II Adlai Ewing Stevenson II (; February 5, 1900 – July 14, 1965) was an American politician and diplomat who was twice the Democratic nominee for President of the United States. He was the grandson of Adlai Stevenson I, the 23rd vice president o ...

shortly before Stevenson's death. The interview was not broadcast over CBS but instead appeared in '' Look'' magazine. However, it was Sevareid's familiar "think-pieces," which familiarized him with viewers worldwide.

''CBS Evening News'' appearances

On November 22, 1963, Sevareid joined

Walter Cronkite Walter Leland Cronkite Jr. (November 4, 1916 – July 17, 2009) was an American broadcast journalist who served as anchorman for the ''CBS Evening News'' for 19 years (1962–1981). During the 1960s and 1970s, he was often cited as "the mo ...

on CBS television with a commentary about the assassination of John F. Kennedy and the road ahead for the new president,

Lyndon Johnson Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), often referred to by his initials LBJ, was an American politician who served as the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. He had previously served as the 37th vice ...

. From 1964 to his 1977 retirement from the network, Sevareid's two-minute segments on the ''

'' (anchored by Cronkite) inspired his admirers to dub him "The Grey Eminence." During his long run as a commentator, his segments earned both

Emmy The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...

and Peabody Awards. In 1987, he was honored as an inductee into the Academy's Fourth Hall of Fame. Those who disagreed with his views nicknamed him "Eric Severalsides." Sevareid recognized his own biases, which caused some to disagree with him vehemently. He said that as he had grown older, he had tended to become more conservative in foreign policy and liberal in domestic policy. His commentary touched on many of the day's important issues. After a 1966 trip to

South Vietnam South Vietnam, officially the Republic of Vietnam ( vi, Việt Nam Cộng hòa), was a state in Southeast Asia that existed from 1955 to 1975, the period when the southern portion of Vietnam was a member of the Western Bloc during part of th ...

, he commented that prolonging the war would be unwise and that the US would be better off pursuing a negotiated settlement. He also helped keep alive another Murrow tradition at CBS that began with the interview show '' Person to Person''. On ''Conversations with Eric Sevareid'', he interviewed such famous newsmakers as West German Chancellor

Willy Brandt Willy Brandt (; born Herbert Ernst Karl Frahm; 18 December 1913 – 8 October 1992) was a German politician and statesman who was leader of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) from 1964 to 1987 and served as the chancellor of West Ger ...

and novelist

Leo Rosten Leo Calvin Rosten (Yiddish: ; April 11, 1908 – February 19, 1997) was an American humorist in the fields of scriptwriting, storywriting, journalism, and Yiddish lexicography. Early life Rosten was born into a Yiddish-speaking family in Łód ...

. In somewhat of a spoof of that tradition, he also had a conversation with

King George III George III (George William Frederick; 4 June 173829 January 1820) was King of Great Britain and of Ireland from 25 October 1760 until the union of the two kingdoms on 1 January 1801, after which he was King of the United Kingdom of Great B ...

, portrayed by

Peter Ustinov Sir Peter Alexander Ustinov (born Peter Alexander Freiherr von Ustinov ; 16 April 192128 March 2004) was a British actor, filmmaker and writer. An internationally known raconteur, he was a fixture on television talk shows and lecture circuits ...

, titled ''The Last King in America''. Sevareid later narrated the American history series ''Between The Wars''. In 1981, Sevareid hosted a documentary series on PBS, entitled ''Enterprise'', a profile on how America portrays business. The following year, he hosted the syndicated newsmagazine program ''Eric Sevareid's Chronicle''. He made a guest appearance as himself in a 1980 episode of the sitcom ''

Taxi A taxi, also known as a taxicab or simply a cab, is a type of vehicle for hire with a driver, used by a single passenger or small group of passengers, often for a non-shared ride. A taxicab conveys passengers between locations of their choic ...

'' and a cameo appearance in the 1983 space flight film '' The Right Stuff''.

Personal life

Sevareid married the former Lois Finger. They had twin sons, Peter and Michael, born in Paris while Sevareid was stationed there as a war correspondent for CBS. Sevareid's second marriage was to Belen Marshall. They had a daughter, Cristina, born in New York while he was working as a commentator at the New York bureau.

Death

Sevareid died of stomach cancer in Washington, D.C., on July 9, 1992, at age 79.

Honors

*1950, 1964, 1976: Peabody Award *1954: Alfred I. duPont Award *1964:

State of North Dakota North Dakota () is a U.S. state in the Upper Midwest, named after the indigenous Dakota Sioux. North Dakota is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba to the north and by the U.S. states of Minnesota to the east, South ...

Theodore Roosevelt Rough Rider Award *1965: New York Newspaper Guild Page One Award *1977: Paul White Award,

Radio Television Digital News Association The Radio Television Digital News Association (RTDNA, pronounced the same as " rotunda"), formerly the Radio-Television News Directors Association (RTNDA), is a United States-based membership organization of radio, television, and online news dire ...

*Emmy Award winner: **Best News Reporter or Commentator – 1955 **Best News Commentary – 1958 *1993: Inducted posthumously into the Scandinavian-American Hall of Fame *On October 5, 2007, the United States Postal Service announced that it would honor five

journalists A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...

of the 20th century with first-class rate

postage stamp A postage stamp is a small piece of paper issued by a post office, postal administration, or other authorized vendors to customers who pay postage (the cost involved in moving, insuring, or registering mail), who then affix the stamp to the f ...

s, to be issued on Tuesday, April 22, 2008: Martha Gellhorn,

John Hersey John Richard Hersey (June 17, 1914 – March 24, 1993) was an American writer and journalist. He is considered one of the earliest practitioners of the so-called New Journalism, in which storytelling techniques of fiction are adapted to n ...

, George Polk, Rubén Salazar, and Eric Sevareid;

Postmaster General A Postmaster General, in Anglosphere countries, is the chief executive officer of the postal service of that country, a ministerial office responsible for overseeing all other postmasters. The practice of having a government official responsib ...

Jack Potter announced the stamp series at the Associated Press Managing Editors Meeting in Washington, D.C.; Sevareid had covered the fall of France to the Germans in World War II; he was a critic of Sen.

's anti-communism campaignAfp.google.com, Stamps Honor Distinguished Journalists

References

Works

* ''Canoeing with the Cree'', 1935, reprinted 1968 * ''Not So Wild a Dream'' (autobiography), 1946, reissued 1976 * ''In One Ear: 107 Snapshots of Men and Events which Make a Far-Reaching Panorama of the American Situation at Mid-Century'' (essays), Knopf, 1952. * ''Small Sounds in the Night: A Collection of Capsule Commentaries on the American Scene'', Knopf, 1956. * ''This is Eric Sevareid'' (essays), McGraw, 1964. * (With Robert A. Smith) ''Washington: Magnificent Capital'', Doubleday, 1965. * (With John Case) ''Enterprise: The Making of Business in America'', McGraw-Hill, 1983.

External links

Yesterday's News
Excerpt from "Canoeing with the Cree" series, Minneapolis Star, September 6, 1930 * Recording of final broadcast message, November 30, 1977. *
Raymond A. Schroth, S.J. Research Papers for Sevareid Biography
Finding Aid at

Loyola University New Orleans Loyola University New Orleans is a private Jesuit university in New Orleans, Louisiana. Originally established as Loyola College in 1904, the institution was chartered as a university in 1912. It bears the name of the Jesuit founder, Saint Igna ...

Eric Sevareid Awards
Midwest Broadcast Journalists Association
Eric Sevareid papers
Library of Congress Manuscript Division {{DEFAULTSORT:Sevareid, Eric 1912 births 1992 deaths American broadcast news analysts American people of Norwegian descent American radio reporters and correspondents American television journalists CBS News people Deaths from cancer in Washington, D.C. Deaths from stomach cancer Peabody Award winners People from McHenry County, North Dakota Radio personalities from Minneapolis University of Minnesota School of Journalism and Mass Communication alumni American war correspondents of World War II Writers from North Dakota 60 Minutes correspondents American male journalists Journalists from North Dakota Journalists from Minnesota Central High School (Minneapolis, Minnesota) alumni 20th-century American journalists