The 1956 Conventions: The Birth Of A Team

The 1956 Conventions: The Birth Of A Team

In 1956, both the Democratic (San Francisco) and Republican (Chicago) political conventions were big events for television. To anchor at both, NBC paired Chet Huntley and David Brinkley. They were well received and the rest, as they say, is history.

By 1956, NBC executives had grown dissatisfied with Swayze in his role anchoring the network’s evening news program, which in ’55 fell behind its main competition, CBS’s Douglas Edwards with the News. Network executive Ben Park suggested replacing Swayze with Chet Huntley and David Brinkley. Bill McAndrew, NBC’s director of news (later NBC News president), had seen a highly rated local news program on NBC affiliate WSAZ-TV in Huntington, West Virginia, with two anchors reporting from different cities.

On October 29, 1956, he replaced ‘The Camel News Caravan’ with ‘The Huntley-Brinkley Report’, with Huntley in New York and Brinkley in Washington. Producer Reuven Frank, who had advocated pairing Huntley and Brinkley for the convention coverage, thought using two anchors on a regular news program “was one of the dumber ideas I had ever heard.” Nonetheless, on the day of the new program’s first broadcast, Frank authored the program’s closing line, “Good night, Chet. Good night, David. And good night, for NBC News.” This exchange became one of television’s most famous catchphrases even though both Huntley and Brinkley initially disliked it.

Huntley handled the bulk of the news most nights, with Brinkley specializing in Washington-area news. The closing credits music for the broadcast was the second movement of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, from the 1952 studio recording with Arturo Toscanini conducting the NBC Symphony Orchestra.

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