Meet the Press: Difference between revisions

[[File:Meet the Press with Tim Russert Logo 2005.png|thumb|Logo used from 2005 to 2008]]

[[File:meetthepress110975.jpg|right|thumb|''Meet the Press'' set, November 1975. On this broadcast, a sitting American president ([[Gerald Ford]]) was, for the first time, a guest on a live television network news program.]]

''Meet the Press'' began on [[radio]] on the [[Mutual Broadcasting System]] in 1945 as ''American Mercury Presents: Meet the Press'',<ref>{{cite web|title=60 Years Ago in News History: America Meets the Press|url=http://www.newseum.org/news/news.aspx?item=jn_MTP071114&style=f|publisher=[[Newseum]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081117170923/http://www.newseum.org/news/news.aspx?item=jn_MTP071114&style=f |archive-date=November 17, 2008 }}</ref> a program to promote ''[[The American Mercury]]'', a magazine that [[Lawrence Spivak]] purchased in 1935.<ref name="NYT Sale 1935">{{cite news |date=January 23, 1935 |title=American Mercury Sold to L. E. Spivak |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9C00E4D8103FE53ABC4B51DFB766838E629EDE&legacy=true |work=[[The New York Times]] |access-date=2017-08-02 }}</ref> Before the program aired, Spivak had asked journalist [[Martha Rountree]], who had worked in radio and had been employed by Spivak as a roving editor for the magazine, to critique plans for a new radio show. As a result, Rountree created a new radio program that she called ''The American Mercury'', on October 5, 1945.<ref name="shemadeit">{{cite web|title=Martha Rountree: Radio/Television Producer, Writer, Host |url=http://www.shemadeit.org/meet/biography.aspx?m=150 |work=shemadeit.org |publisher=[[The Paley Center for Media|Paley Center for Media]] |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304032421/http://www.shemadeit.org/meet/biography.aspx?m=150 |archive-date=2016-03-04 }}</ref>

 

 

===Under Russert===

[[File:US Navy 060305-F-0193C-009 Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, U.S. Marine Corps, Gen. Peter Pace, responds to a question asked by host Tim Russert during an interview on NBC's Meet the Press.jpg|thumb|Russert interviews [[General (United States)|General]] [[Peter Pace]] in 2006.]]

Network officials, concerned for the show's future, turned to [[Tim Russert]], the network's bureau chief in Washington, D.C. He took over as moderator of ''Meet the Press'' on December 8, 1991, and remained with the program until his death on June 13, 2008, becoming the longest-serving moderator in the program's history.<ref>{{cite web|title=Fast facts about the longest-running program in TV history |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna21872087|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071121225114/http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21872087/|url-status=live|archive-date=2007-11-21|work=MSNBC.com}}</ref>