Bernard Shaw

Bernard Shaw is a hard-driving news anchor with a deep authoritative voice and unemotional delivery who became a household name for his coverage of the Gulf War from inside the Baghdad war zone. Described as subdued, calm and thoughtful in his approach to reporting, the seasoned TV journalist with a faint dusting of gray in his hair has gained a steady reputation in media circles and to national and international cable viewers as anchor of CNN's daily Prime News shows.

Since boyhood, Shaw was determined to break into broadcasting, though in the 1950s there were no Black role models. After a stint in the Marines, where a chance meeting with veteran TV newsman Walter Cronkite turned into a lifelong friendship, Shaw began his career in radio, and soon thereafter joined Westinghouse Broadcasting as a White House correspondent in 1968. He was hired as a correspondent by CBS News in 1971 in the Washington bureau where his colleagues through the years were some of the best names in the business: Dan Rather, Eric Sevareid, Marvin and Bernard Kalb, Bob Schieffer and Leslie Stahl.

The opportunity to work as a foreign correspondent took Shaw to ABC News in 1977 where he became the network's Latin American correspondent and bureau chief. For three years he covered the political hot spots in both Central and South America. Offered a new contract and a spot in ABC's Washington bureau in 1980, Shaw instead went with an offer from the then-starting cable network CNN. Besides becoming co-anchor of CNN's flagship Prime Times News and several of its daily news broadcasts, he also hosted some of the station's public affairs programming.

During his first decade of tenure with CNN, Shaw's credentials as a first-rate correspondent and anchor were greatly enhanced. With an impending war about to break out in the Gulf in 1991, he requested an assignment to Baghdad. The decision proved prophetic as Shaw found himself in the thick of things as U.S. missiles rained down on the Iraqi capital. Shaw's daily live exclusive broadcasts from Baghdad became the talk of the nation and overnight made him one of the giants of U.S. broadcasting.

Another highlight of Shaw's career was his dispassionate reports on the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan in 1981; the Iraqi missile attack in May of 1987 that killed 37 American sailors; his joining top colleagues from the three major networks in a pre-Gorbachev-summit interview with President Reagan in 1987 that was broadcast nationally; and several exclusive interviews with Reagan, George Bush and other prominent newsmakers.

Bernard Shaw died on September 7, 2022 at the age of 82.