Bill Beutel, 75, ‘Eyewitness News’ Anchor

Bill Beutel, who died Saturday at 75, spent the better part of 40 years in New York television news as half the anchor team leading the brash “Eyewitness News,” on ABC, Channel 7.He was among the most recognizable of New York broadcast newsmen, and for much of his career helped generate high local ratings. Together with co-anchor Roger Grimsby, Beutel helped launch an era in which news anchors indulged in spirited banter during the broadcast. With the acerbic Grimsby, such crosstalk could be amusing and informative; all too often in other contexts, it degenerates into “happy talk.”Key to the success of “Eyewitness News” was the show’s lively stable of reporters, who came to resemble an amusingly obstreperous, multiracial family, with Beutel and Grimsby keeping order. There was features reporter Melba Tolliver, and Geraldo Rivera, a young crusader who in 1972 exposed appalling conditions at the Willowbrook State School on Staten Island. Sports were reported by Frank Gifford and the skeptical Jim Bouton, both New York professional team veterans. Tex Antoine handled the weather, until he spouted off in appallingly bad taste after a story about the rape of a five-year-old girl, leading to his ouster in 1974; somehow the episode made the newscast edgier and more of a must watch – anything could happen.The partnership with Grimsby ran from 1970 through 1986, at which time Grimsby was tossed overboard by ABC management, possibly in a move to cut costs. Both garnered top salaries since kicking off “Eyewitness News” at the then-phenomenal rate of $100,000 a year. Beutel continued as anchor until 2001, sometimes partnered with younger co-anchors to liven things up, but the old energy never quite returned.Although an experienced reporter who had served as ABC’s bureau chief in London in the 1960s, Beutel more and more came to be literally an anchor, almost chained to his desk. “When was the last time Bill covered anything in New York?” wrote Newsday TV critic Marvin Kitman in 1992. “There are young people watching TV news today who think Bill Beutel has no legs.”This was not quite fair – although it was not within the youngsters’ living memory that Beutel had reported as an imbedded reporter in Vietnam. He returned for an update in 1995. In 2001, soon after he retired as anchor but stayed on board as a contributor, he filed a report from war-torn Sierra Leone, where he was seen sparring verbally with a glowering rebel leader who demanded that Beutel rephrase his questions more politely.“Noted,” Beutel replied, on-camera.Beutel – the name was pronounced “Boydel” but an early news director didn’t like the sound of it – grew up in Cleveland, the son of a dentist. He said that listening to Edward Murrow’s live radio reports from London during the Blitz made him choose broadcast journalism, and later, when he was posted to London, he made a pilgrimage to the spot where Murrow broadcast.After a year of law school and a stint on Cleveland radio, Beutel came to New York as a CBS radio newsman. In 1962, at just 32, he was hired as anchor of the 6 p.m. ABC broadcast “The Big News,” the first time an hour-long news program had been tried in New York. The show featured steady newsmen Jim Burnes and Ron Cochrane, and an acerbic sports commentator named Howard Cosell. A year later, despite some good reviews, the show split in two, with Beutel helming the New York segment, while Cochrane became national anchor.In 1968, Beutel went to London as the ABC bureau chief; he covered the Paris Peace Talks during Vietnam and the Nigerian civil war during his stint overseas. In 1970, he was called back to New York to split anchoring duties with Roger Grimsby, whose skeptical on-air humor needed a straight man to keep the package credible. The pair got along well, and ratings soared. They became iconic enough that, at one point in 1973, each was attacked outside the ABC studios on 66th Street by the same deranged young woman who claimed they had slandered her. She claimed Beutel had called her a hippopotamus on air. She kicked him in the groin. A couple of months later, she came after Grimsby with an ice pick, and was charged with attempted murder.In 1975, Beutel left “Eyewitness News” to help found “A.M. America,” the predecessor to ABC’s “Good Morning America.” Morning happy talk appeared not to suit him, and he soon returned to Grimsby’s sardonic side.After his retirement as anchor, Beutel continued to work on special reports for ABC, and after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, he reported on New York’s recovery. He took off his trench coat for the last time in 2003,sold his Bridgeport mansion for millions, and retired to North Carolina, where he golfed and traveled occasionally.William Charles BeutelBorn December 12, 1930, in Cleveland, Ohio; died March 17 at his home in Pinehurst, N.C., of the effects of a degenerative neurological disease; survived by his fourth wife, Adair (nee Atwell), four children, Peter Beutel, Robin Gamble, Colby Beutel-Burns, and Heather Fortinbery, eight grandchildren, and a sister, Mary Lou Henley.

Bill Beutel, 75, ‘Eyewitness News’ Anchor

Bill Beutel, 75, ‘Eyewitness News’ Anchor

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