We lost one of the great ones this week. Bill Moyers. Public servant. Minister. Journalist. Documentary producer.
I never met Bill Moyers, but I want to believe I came really close. He was born across the Red River from my home in Paris, Texas. Hugo, Oklahoma. My mother’s hometown.
Bill grew up in Marshall, Texas. He would later profile it in a documentary called “Marshall, Texas, Marshall, Texas.” One town. Two perspectives. Bill Moyers did many more documentaries.
Moyers went to his grave not telling secrets. Jonathan Alter writes on Substack that he and others tried for years to get him to tell stories about President Lyndon Johnson. He never would.
Moyers relationship with LBJ was beautiful until it wasn’t. He was one of the President’s top aides. His Press Secretary. President Johnson regarded Moyers as the son he never had. Then, Moyers left the White House. Resigned. The two never spoke again.
Bill Moyers helped start PBS. The Peace Corps. A true public servant.
He also was one of the early critics of how television news was becoming “infotainment.” Specifically, CBS News.
This is what he told Alter for Newsweek: “The line between entertainment and news was steadily blurred. Our center of gravity shifted from the standards and practices of the news business to show business.”
Unfortunately, Bill Moyers was correct. That bell has been rung. No going back now.
Journalist and author Peter Boyer was quoted in the New York Times obituary about Bill Moyers. He called him “a rare and powerful voice, a kind of secular evangelist.”
Bill Moyers was, in fact, an ordained Baptist minister.
Imagine. The day President Kennedy was assassinated, Bill Moyers was on Air Force One as Lyndon Johnson was sworn in as the next president.
Bill Moyers witnessed a lot of history. He wrote about much of it too.
Bill Moyers. A giant of journalism. In the realm of Murrow and Cronkite. The best ever.