TELEVISION;Weighing the Future of the Network Anchor
Date: 17 December 1995
By Lawrie Mifflin
Lawrie Mifflin
EACH NIGHT AT 6 O'CLOCK, CARrying on a tradition best represented in the public imagination by Walter Cronkite, the three major television networks bring pleasant, respectable-looking, middle-aged white men into American homes to deliver the day's news. The anchor role has long been viewed as the most prestigious in network journalism, and the men who attain it usually stay at their desks for years. Today, Dan Rather of CBS is 63 years old, Peter Jennings of ABC is 57 and Tom Brokaw of NBC is 55. Each has held his job for more than a decade; none talks of retiring soon. And last month, NBC gave Brian Williams, its 36-year-old White House correspondent and substitute anchor, a contract that will pay him more than $1.5 million a year through 2000, tacitly anointing him as Mr. Brokaw's eventual successor and another perpetuator of the Cronkite tradition.
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WORD & IMAGE;THE MURDER BROADCASTING SYSTEM
Date: 17 December 1995
By Max Frankel
Max Frankel
HOW MUCH longer will Americans tolerate the cult of violence that passes for "local news" on television? Even as crime rates subside, the wicked nightly assault on our senses gets louder. The more advanced the technology by which stations prepare their 10 or 11 P.M. summaries of the day, the greater the mayhem they import to arouse our anxiety and disturb our sleep. Deliberate? You bet. Cynical? Completely. And pervasive.
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James Altgens, Photographer at Kennedy Assassination, Dies at 76
Date: 17 December 1995
By Eric Pace
Eric Pace
James W. Altgens, a longtime Associated Press staff member known for his photograph of the anguished Jacqueline Kennedy, seconds after her husband's assassination, clambering onto the back of their car while a Secret Service agent moved to her aid, was found dead on Tuesday in his home in Dallas. He was 76. Mr. Altgens, who was retired, and his wife, Clara, 73, were both found dead at the home, The Associated Press reported. The Dallas Morning News reported on Friday that relatives said the couple had been suffering from the flu but that the police were looking into the possibility that they had died of carbon monoxide poisoning from a defective furnace.
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TV Ownership Rules Stall Communications Bill
Date: 16 December 1995
By Edmund L. Andrews
Edmund Andrews
House Republicans are trying to insert a provision in the telecommunications bill that would block Federal regulators from plugging loopholes in television ownership rules that have greatly benefited CBS, the Tribune Company and the News Corporation's Fox television network. The provision, being pushed in a House-Senate conference, would also block the Federal Communications Commission from challenging two television deals -- one by the News Corporation and one by the Tribune Company -- that have attracted heavy scrutiny from regulators and are considered in at least some danger of being overturned next year.
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U.S. Writer and Aide Wounded in Russia
Date: 17 December 1995
By The New York Times
An American journalist and his Georgian assistant were injured today during fighting in the Russian republic of Chechnya.
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COMPANY NEWS
Date: 16 December 1995
GENERAL SIGNAL CORP. agreed to sell the last of its Leeds & Northrup unit to Honeywell Inc.'s Industrial Control division, noting the sale will complete the divestiture of its discontinued operations. Terms were not disclosed.
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COMPANY NEWS;TALISMAN ENERGY IN BID FOR GOAL PETROLEUM
Date: 16 December 1995
Dow Jones
Dow Jones
Talisman Energy Inc. of Calgary, Alberta, said yesterday that it would make a takeover bid for Goal Petroleum P.L.C., a London-based oil exploration and production company, for $274.7 million (Canadian), or about $200 million (United States). Talisman, an oil and gas company, said the purchase of Goal was part of its strategy for growth in North Sea exploration. Goal's board has recommended the offer to shareholders, and holders of about 29 percent of Goal's shares have agreed to tender their stake. According to Talisman, during the six months ended June 30 Goal had pretax profit of almost L6.9 million ($10.6 million), up from L3.5 million a year earlier.
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COMPANY NEWS;ITT WILL SPLIT INTO THREE COMPANIES ON TUESDAY
Date: 16 December 1995
AP
The ITT Corporation set a date of Tuesday for its breakup into three separate companies after receiving a favorable tax ruling on the spinoffs, its chairman, Rand V. Araskog, said yesterday. The $25 billion conglomerate announced in June that it planned to divide itself into three parts: an insurance company, an industrial products manufacturer, and a casino, hotel and sports company. Its shareholders approved the breakup in September, but the deal was contingent on obtaining a ruling from the Internal Revenue Service that the spinoffs would be tax free for shareholders. The company has now received the ruling from the I.R.S. Shareholders will get one share in each new company for every share they own in ITT.
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