NEW YORK — Edwin Newman, who brought literacy, wit and energy to NBC newscasts for more than three decades, and battled linguistic pretense and clutter in his best sellers “Strictly Speaking” and “A Civil Tongue,” has died. He was 91.
Newman died Aug. 13 of pneumonia in Oxford, England. He moved there with his wife in 2007 to live closer to their daughter, said his lawyer, Rupert Mead. He said the family delayed announcing Newman’s death so they could spend time privately grieving.
At NBC from 1952 until his retirement in 1984, Newman did political reporting, foreign reporting, anchoring of news specials, “Meet the Press,” “Today” and “Nightly News.” He announced President John F. Kennedy’s death on radio and anchored on TV when President Ronald Rea gan was shot.
He narrated and helped write documentaries when they were an influential staple of network programming.
Newman, with his rumpled appearance and squinting delivery, impressed his audience not so much with how he looked as with the likelihood that what he’d say would be worth hearing, with an occasional witty turn of phrase.
The New York Times wrote in 1966 that Newman “is one of broadcasting’s rarities. . . . NBC’s instant renaissance man speaks with the distinctive growl of a rusted muffler. He makes no concessions to the charm boy school of commentator.”
He turned to writing books in the 1970s, taking on the linguistic excesses of Watergate, sportscasters, academics, bureaucrats and other assorted creators of gobbledygook with wit and indignation.
After retiring in January 1984, Newman enjoyed being on “Saturday Night Live” skits and in several situation comedies, where, he said, “I’ve always had the demanding job of playing myself.” (In one SNL sketch, he mans a suicide hotline and keeps correcting the desperate caller’s grammar.)
Newman was born in New York City in 1919 and got his first taste of reporting on his high school paper.
After studying at the University of Wisconsin and Louisiana State, Newman worked in the Washington bureau of the International News Service. He took dictation from reporters for 12 hours when Pearl Harbor was attacked on Dec. 7, 1941, and then served in the Navy.
“News is a great business,” Newman once wrote. “I count myself lucky to be in it.”
