Charles Bishop KuraltStraight out of college without a degree, Charles Kuralt worked as an intern at The Charlotte News. After a year, he won CBS's Ernie Pyle award. Instead of accepting the award and feeling proud, young Charles asked, "if you like my work, why don’t you just hire me." They did and he became the youngest CBS correspondent at age 25. He covered the Vietnam War, and stories all over the world including 23 Latin American countries. The gentle man that he was, Charles Kuralt did not enjoy wars, nor covering them in the midst of bullets and bloody soldiers. He dropped hard news reporting and took to the road to do his own show called "On the Road with Charles Kuralt."
Throughout his life, he won 13 Emmys, many other broadcasting awards, and was on the New York Times Best Seller List several times. He not only contributed to Chapel Hill and North Carolina but he helped the whole country learn to recognize that good news is news. Out of all the places he had been in his life, he chose to come back to UNC to be buried. Before he passed away, he was able to get a plot in the cemetery on the campus he loved. |