Think of the best news anchor that you watch on your choice of cable network. Then think of how much you trust them to deliver all of the media content that happens throughout a typical 24 hour news day. Now once you think of that, multiply it by 10 and you have CBS news legend Walter Cronkite.

Walter Cronkite was born in Saint Joseph, Missouri in 1916 and lived there until the age of 10 before moving to Texas. Cronkite then went to University of Texas and dropped out his junior year to jumpstart his newspaper reporting job.  It wasn’t until 1950 that Cronkite joined CBS and started his wondrous 31 year career.

Now it is often argued that Cronkite is the best news anchor to have lived. Some say he just got lucky with all of these stories to have fallen into his lap. But in reality, he had to gain the public’s trust in order to keep reporting such events. During a very detrimental time in America, he was the man the public trusted the most to deliver news. With his unflappable diction, easy-going nature, and his blatant modesty, Cronkite captivated the American public.

Cronkite reported many famous news events such as the bombings in World War II, the Nuremburg trials, combat in the Vietnam War, the Watergate scandal, the Iran Hostage Crisis, and the murders of John F. Kennedy, John Lennon and Martin Luther King Jr. At a time in which the American population was in a state of constant distress, Cronkite was there to alleviate the stress with his smooth delivery and casual demeanor.

In today’s society, media is an even greater part of our lives. We are constantly updated every single minute of the day when there is breaking news and it is practically impossible to be out of the loop. America can report events live and have such events on TV in a very quick amount of time. It’s quite wonderful, actually; however, there are some downfalls to such quickness.

The downside of media happens to be social media. Social media is not always true and it has definitely impacted the younger generation with sites such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Social media is a faster way to get the news out to the public, but most of the information can be skewed as well. Now that the United States is more of a digital economy, less and less people are watching the news.

Generally, the world will most likely never see another news broadcaster such as Walter Cronkite. He made such a huge impact on the future of news broadcasting and paved the way for others to follow in his path. Cronkite died July 17^th, 2009 after a long, fruitful life of doing what he loved best. So in the words of Cronkite at the end of each CBS Evening News segment, “That’s the way it is.”