It’s been quite a year for television anchor Katie Couric, whose contract with “CBS Evening News” ended the same month that her 90-year-old father died.
According to the Washington Post, former journalist and P.R. executive John M. Couric died June 22 at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington. Katie confirmed the death of her dad, who passed away from Parkinson’s Disease complications.
A wire service editor who claimed to have abandoned the “high priesthood of journalism” to enter the public relations field, John told the Washington Post in 1991 that he urged daughter Katie to pursue a broadcast career.
“I encouraged her to go into broadcasting because I thought it was more promising than print, having been in print myself,” John told the newspaper.
John wrote about Georgia politics and the state capitol for the Atlanta Constitution before hopping on board with the United Press wire service in the late 1940s. In 1951, John joined United Press’s Washington bureau and covered Lyndon Johnson’s heart attack. John was a UP editor until 1957, when he moved to public relations. In 1985, John retired after six years of speech and article writing for the Food and Drug Administration. An Arlington resident, John attended American University and taught at the University of Maryland for 27 years.
Even with the loss of a parent, there’s light at the end of the tunnel. Earlier this month, Katie announced that she would host a weekday talk show on ABC News. (Katie Couric announces CBS exit)
“People are interested in intelligent conversation and perspective, something that puts the tsunami of information that crosses over us each day into some type of context,” Couric announced. “The show will have smart conversation about a lot of different things.”