About Me
Born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada on July 29, 1938. Jennings was the son of Charles Jennings, the first news anchor and head of the news department at the CBC. After the family moved to Ottawa, Ontario, Peter grew up there and attended Lisgar Collegiate Institute, Carleton University, University of Ottawa, and Rider College in New Jersey. He never graduated from high school or college, preferring to begin his radio career.
He got his start in broadcasting at the age of nine, hosting a weekly half-hour CBC Radio kids' show called Peter's Program.At the age of 23, he was hired by a Brockville, Ontario radio station. After his coverage of a local train wreck was picked up by the CBC, Canada's first private TV network CTV (a competitor of his father's network) hired Jennings to co-anchor its late-night national news. He was assigned to cover civil rights activities, where he was quickly noticed by American network ABC and in 1964 was hired away as a correspondent. Barely a year later, he was given several high-profile reporting opportunities for what was then a 15-minute news broadcast on ABC Evening News.In 1962, Jennings co-anchored the CTV network news.His first stint as ABC's anchor took place in 1965 on the appropriately named "Peter Jennings with the News." At 26, he was and is the youngest ever American network news anchor.On April 5, 2005, Jennings informed viewers through a taped message that he was diagnosed with lung cancer, and was starting chemotherapy treatment the following week. (Jennings reportedly started smoking when he was 13 years old but quit in 1988, then briefly resumed following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.) Though he said he would continue to host World News Tonight when possible, this would prove to be his final broadcast. ABC News' Charles Gibson and Elizabeth Vargas served as temporary anchors until his death.Jennings died after his bout with lung cancer in his New York City home on the evening of Sunday, August 7, 2005, about 4 months after the air of his farewell broadcast. Married four times, he is survived by his wife, producer Kayce Freed, and his two children, Elizabeth and Christopher (who were from his third marriage, to journalist Kati Marton). He had also been married to Valerie Godsoe, followed by Annie Malouf. Charles Gibson announced Jennings' death at 11:41 PM (Eastern Time) on August 7, 2005 on an ABC News special report and read his life story. Barbara Walters gave her comments during this, as did fellow ABC anchors Diane Sawyer and Ted Koppel.Jennings was a dual citizen of Canada and the United States, having become an American citizen on May 30, 2003. He was said to have been very proud of scoring 100 of 100 on the U.S. citizenship exam. Even though Jennings became a dual citizen, he was still a proud Canadian, and would often retire in the summer to Wakefield, Quebec near his native Ottawa.
