Chicago News Anchor, Randy Salerno, Dies but Leaves Fond Memories

Many residents of Chicago woke up Friday morning eager to finish up the workweek. Some got their coffee and turned on the news to start their morning only to be hit with unsettling news as videos and pictures of a beloved local news anchor were flashed across the screen during CBS2's early morning coverage.

CBS2 Anchorman, Randy Salerno, had recently gone on a long-awaited trip with friends in Sayner, Wisconsin near Eagle River. They were snowmobiling when the snowmobile of his childhood friend, Scott Hirshey, broke down. Salerno offered to let his friend drive his own snowmobile and he would ride passenger, even though his snowmobile was only supposed to seat one.

The snowmobile they were riding on, a 2007 Sea-Doo, went off the trail, striking several trees. Hirshey was thrown free but Salerno remained on the snowmobile taking the full force of the impact. He was killed instantly by blunt force trauma to the head after hitting one of the trees. Salerno leaves behind a wife, Irene, and three children. Alcohol is said to be a factor in the crash as the group of friends stopped at a pub during their ride and Hirshey may even face charges for the death of his friend.

Randy Salerno was described as "larger than life" by his colleagues due to his humor both on air and behind the scenes. He's described as the guy who always had a joke to tell and he made the news interesting to watch. Randy's zany on-air stunts like donning a King Tut-inspired hat, standing on the abdomen of a gymnast bent backwards in a bridge, fishing with cheeseburger still in the wrapper as bait, group-hugging his morning co-workers, sharing photos of his Velma (Scooby Doo) Halloween costume after telling viewers, "My wife sends me out a couple of hours before the party we were supposed to go to and I'd misjudged her size, apparently, and she said it made her butt look big, so I wore the Velma [costume]."

Co-workers say that it was Randy who made it so easy to come into work at three in the morning to do the morning show with his laid-back personality and generous one-liners.

"He was a great listener and that's what made him a great journalist," Kristyn Hartman, a co-anchor said of Randy.

"The funny guy down the block" was how one viewer described him in an e-mail. The station seemed overwhelmed with the sheer amount of e-mails they've been receiving about Salerno.

"I don't think a single work day has gone by when Randy's unique humor hasn't made me laugh right out loud & I can't count the times I'd stop what I should be doing to run to the TV to actually see what he was up to," wrote a viewer named JoEllyn Frederickson. Vern Anderson, another viewer says, "I feel as though I have lost a good friend, and I will miss him terribly."

When we watch the news, we see the same faces every day and we begin to trust those faces. They become part of our lives and we feel as if we know these people. They are as real to anyone as if they were sitting across the kitchen table having a coffee and giving you the morning news and when they are suddenly gone, it's very common to feel lost, abandoned, and even sick with grief when realizing we will never hear the same reassuring voice give us the news and we will never see another silly live report from someone who made us laugh throughout the years.

Local news anchors have the power to affect viewers this way more than any other. In a local market, viewers relate more. Anchors are usually pillars in the community, raising their families alongside the families of the viewers. Their environment is the same environment of their viewers - their concerns are usually the same as their viewers. There is a connection there like no other and hearing of a local media personality dying impacts viewers more than even the viewer would expect. They feel they have lost a friend of their family.

KTLA-10 anchor, Hal Fishman, was one of those anchors whose passing left viewers in his wake feeling as if part of their lives had been changed. Fishman was an award-winning anchor who fought against the "dumbing down" of news (celebrity news, car chases, obvious bias, etc.). Many considered him to be the last of his kind.

In an interview with the Los Angeles Times, Joe Saltzman, a journalism professor at the USC Annenberg School for Communication, said, "He wanted to give people news that affected their lives, stories of substance. I don't think a Hal Fishman would be hired today in a local news market."

Fishman's journalism career spanned nearly 50 years and he had been a fixture at KTLA since 1975. His integrity and dedication to serious journalism and bringing straight facts to the viewers made him one of the most respectable local news authorities in Los Angeles and reportedly was the longest-running TV news anchor in the nation. Fishman also earned a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

"I loved Hal. I loved his voice, his delivery, and his general friendly attitude and manner. His presence was just a comfort in some way, which I can't really explain," wrote viewer Kathy Stevens after Hal's death from colon cancer on August 8^th, 2007.

Kathy wasn't the only one who felt that way. Just as CBS2 is being flooded with e-mails of support from viewers over the death of Randy Salerno, KTLA also was shown an outpouring of support from the community with e-mails of shock, disbelief, and fond remembrance of Hal Fishman. Over 2,000 letters were sent in praising Hal and his excellence in journalism.

Pete Wilson of San Francisco's KGO-TV was another news anchor whose loss was felt by the community. Wilson passed away at the age of 62 on July 20, 2007 after having a heart attack that resulted after a hip replacement surgery.

A story about the life and death of Wilson on SFGate.com refers to Pete Wilson as a "Bay Area institution". Wilson won six local Emmys in San Francisco and two Peabody awards.

Unlike Hal Fishman's penchant for reporting facts only, Wilson was known for clearly showing his opinions.

"Other news anchors read the news. Wilson instructed you. He gave you the impression he had some things to tell you, and you'd be wise to sit up, pipe down and pay attention. And, if it was one of those stories that piqued his ever-vigilant sense of outrage, there was likely to be eye-rolling, deep sighs, and even some head-shaking at the ridiculousness of it all," C.W. Nevius, of the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

Despite the outspoken opinions of the Vietnam veteran and University of Wisconsin graduate, he was a much-respected member of the community for over thirty years. KGO Radio and TV got so many letters of condolence that they opened up a blog site just for readers to leave their thoughts. Over 2,000 responded with condolences and memories of Pete Wilson.

Every community has a hero in the media that touches the hearts of thousands through the airwaves. For Cincinnati, Ohio, it was baseball announcer Joe Nuxhall. Cincinnati is a sports city, by all definitions hosting the Cincinnati Reds, Bengals, and having three universities nearby: the University of Cincinnati, Xavier University, and Miami University. The city, tucked into lush green hills beside a gentle river, is a sports lover's paradise.

Nuxhall made his name in baseball pitching for the Reds in 1944 when he was only fifteen years old and went from one legendary position to his next as a fixture in the Cincinnati sports booth.

Joe was a part of my childhood. In fact, my stepfather said his name so much that I thought he was someone my stepfather knew personally. My mother and I often liked to turn on the Reds games on rainy afternoons and listen to Joe Nuxhall's voice announcing the game as we drifted off to an afternoon nap.

Nuxhall's voice became like a security blanket for me. I always had good feelings whenever I heard that unforgettable voice on the radio. Almost unknowingly, Joe Nuxhall became a part of my psyche and my childhood. It wasn't until I moved 2,000 miles from home and was browsing the local news of Cincinnati, one day, that I saw the headline 'Nuxhall Dies at 79'.

I was sitting at my computer desk and started crying, feeling so stupid for crying over someone I'd personally never even met. My husband was even looking at me like I'd lost my mind.

I was alone in my grief but not alone.

Fans of Joe started arriving in streams outside the Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati. They, like myself, probably couldn't believe how affected they were over "a voice on the radio". A statue of a fifteen year-old Joe poised in throwing the first pitch of his career stands in front of the stadium. Fans came in droves to leave flowers and notes at the statue to show just how much Joe had meant to all of them, to Cincinnati. A fan left a baseball signed with a paraphrase on a favorite Joe Nuxhall quote, "Joe, rounded third and headed to heaven."

In an eerie echo of the same sentiments about the passing of the familiar faces of Randy Salerno, Hal Fishman, and Pete Wilson, a fan of Joe Nuxhall's named Roy Marksberry showed up at the ballpark to pay his respects and told a local reporter, "It's like losing an old friend. I never met the man, but I feel like I know him. Like he's family."

It's part familiarity, part hometown pride that ingrains the faces and voices of our beloved journalists, newscasters, and sports announcers into our lives. Everyone remembers where they are when they hear certain things - when man landed on the moon, when planes struck the World Trade Center, when a sports record is broken...and with sentimental hearts, we will always remember the voices and faces of those who brought us the news day after day, year after year, unfailingly and loyally until the TV screen no longer seemed to serve as a barrier between us and they began to be part of our homes and part of our lives.

Sources: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/weather/chi-salerno_webjan26,0,4885564.story

http://cbs2chicago.com/local/randy.salerno.passes.2.637658.html

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-me-fishman8aug08,1,2545893.story?page=1&ctrack=2&cset=true

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/07/21/BAGKTR4Q675.DTL&type=nocolumn&tsp=1

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071116/SPT04/311160012