Remembering Hugh Downs

This post is long overdue. It’s partly out of my own reluctance, because I have grappled with how to contain this man’s career in the space of a post – because the man was so good at so many different things. But maybe some of it had to do with how familiar he was. I imagined we would always have a world with Hugh Downs in it. He had been around forever, starting out at a local radio station in Ohio in 1939, moving into television in 1950 with WMAQ in Chicago, and finally calling it a career in 1999. And back in July, we lost him at the age of 99.

In those 60 years in broadcasting, Hugh Downs did everything. He was an announcer, billboarding a show about a little clown and a dragon and their human friend. He was right-hand-man to Arlene Francis on the Home show. He was Jack Paar’s sidekick. He hosted Today. He hosted a game show, narrated documentaries, did a series about the challenges and opportunities that come with getting older. He even composed music and recorded albums.

Then came a second act, when ABC hired him to host 20/20, which had suffered a disastrous debut.¹ It was in that capacity I first really came to know of him, as the kindly man who introduced segments and talked with correspondents and informed us that they were in touch, so you be in touch. Downs’ steady presence as host helped the program feel (if you’ll pardon the expression) anchored. 20/20 would never have the hard edges of 60 Minutes, but Downs was perfect for 20/20‘s more populist mix of investigation and human interest.

I’m not going to go through the entire career of Hugh Downs here. It would take much too long, and you can read it elsewhere anyway.² Instead, this remembrance is more subjective, because I remember him so well from all the years I watched him.

If you watched Hugh Downs you noticed how easygoing he seemed, how low-pressure he was, sometimes to the point of seeming sleepy. A spoof of 20/20 that ran in MAD Magazine during the period had Downs asleep at the desk in the final panel as Barbara Walters closed the program.³ It may have been easy to mock, but that low-key nature had much to do with why Downs wore so well. I teach my students that to be on television is to be a guest in your audience’s homes, and the moment you rub them the wrong way, they’ll show you out. Too often people on television forget this and they wear out their welcomes in a hurry. Hugh Downs knew this. He had a terrific ability to ration his wattage, to know how to be the host who knew how to keep a program going without becoming bigger than the show or its purpose, and to do it without wearing out the viewer. He had the ability to be interesting without being dominant.

It helped that Downs was a man who had a genuine curiosity about so much. He was a perpetual student, always finding something new to learn or to be interested in or to read about or to visit. He learned how to scuba dive, how to fly airplanes, how to drive a race car, sailed his own boat across the Pacific. And for a time he was a teacher, too. He lived many lifetimes within the time of his life.⁴

In thinking about the life and career of Hugh Downs, I’m struck by the similarities between him and Dave Garroway: both versatile broadcasters with a cool presence that wore well, especially on longer-form programs like Today (and it’s worth noting that when Downs took over Today after the John Chancellor experiment didn’t work out, more than one reviewer favorably compared Downs’s style to that of Garroway). Both of them were fascinated by so many interests and knew so much about so many things, and their knowledge informed the shows they hosted. On occasion I have wondered if Dave Garroway, had he the benefit of modern treatments for depression and other issues, might have been like Hugh Downs and likewise been able to make his career as long-lasting.

This much I do know, and it’s that Hugh Downs never lost his high regard for his friend Dave Garroway. Many years ago a friend was hoping to produce a documentary about Garroway, and one of the people he called on during his initial investigation was Hugh Downs. Not only was Downs happy to learn of the project, he offered to narrate it. Alas, the documentary never happened, and with it went the chance to hear Downs tell the story of his friend and colleague. It’s my hope, however, that they’re now reunited in the hereafter, maybe hanging around with Studs Terkel and Burr Tillstrom telling stories about the good old days in Chicago.

If there are morning shows in heaven, you know that with Dave Garroway and Hugh Downs at the anchor desk, it’s got to be worth watching.

1. You can watch the debut episode of 20/20 here and see for yourself. It’s bizarre, and indescribably awful. And I say that even though one of the original co-anchors was the awesome Robert Hughes.
2. Such as here.
3. Hugh Downs and Barbara Walters worked together at NBC on Today, and were later reunited on 20/20 at ABC, which was neat.
4. And there was substance to the time of his life. For instance, this story of how he used his position as 20/20 anchor to help an organization that helped others. In a more personal aspect, this story he submitted to Guideposts discusses how he learned to look beyond himself, both in his career and in his own life. It’s well worth reading.