25 Facts About John Charles Daly

1.

The younger of two brothers, John Charles Daly was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, where his American father worked as a geologist.

2.

At that time, John Charles Daly was 11 years old, and attended the Tilton School where he later served on its board of directors for many years, contributing to the construction or restoration of many buildings on campus.

3.

John Charles Daly did his post-secondary education at a junior college and graduated from Boston College.

4.

John Charles Daly worked for a time in a wool factory and a transit company in Washington, DC before becoming a reporter for NBC Radio and, later, CBS.

5.

John Charles Daly began his broadcasting career as a reporter for NBC Radio and then WJSV, the local CBS Radio Network affiliate in Washington, DC, as CBS' White House correspondent.

6.

John Charles Daly appears on the famous "One Day in Radio" tapes of September 21,1939, in which WJSV preserved its entire broadcast day for posterity.

7.

In late 1941, John Charles Daly transferred to New York City, where he became anchor of The World Today.

8.

John Charles Daly was a war correspondent in 1943 in Italy during Gen.

9.

John Charles Daly was the first national correspondent to deliver the news of the attack on Pearl Harbor on Sunday, December 7,1941, and he was the first to relay the wire service report of the death of President Franklin D Roosevelt on April 12,1945, interrupting the program Wilderness Road to deliver the news.

10.

Cerf and John Charles Daly enjoyed a friendly feud from across the stage for the remainder of the history of the program.

11.

John Charles Daly had received many letters over the years asking him to fill that role; until the finale he never could, because John Charles Daly served as the "emergency mystery guest", in case the scheduled celebrity failed to show on the live program.

12.

The series inspired a multitude of concurrent international versions and a syndicated US revival in 1968 in which John Charles Daly did not participate.

13.

John Charles Daly was a vice president at ABC during the 1950s.

14.

John Charles Daly was a narrator on The Voice of Firestone starting in 1958.

15.

John Charles Daly had several television and movie guest appearances from the late 1940s to the mid-1960s, including an uncredited role in Bye Bye Birdie and as the narrator, in a mock documentary style, on the premiere episode of the rural comedy series Green Acres.

16.

John Charles Daly filled in occasionally on NBC's The Today Show, making Daly one of the few people to work simultaneously on all three networks.

17.

John Charles Daly became completely convulsed in laughter during the live telecast on the NBC network.

18.

John Charles Daly stated that "the last straw" that led to his resignation was the decision of the then-president of ABC, Leonard Goldenson, to bring in Time Inc to co-produce documentaries that had previously been under John Charles Daly's direction for the network.

19.

John Charles Daly assumed the position on September 20,1967, but lasted only until June 6,1968, when he resigned over a claim that Leonard H Marks, his superior at the US Information Agency, had been making personnel changes behind Daly's back.

20.

From December 1968 to January 1969, John Charles Daly hosted the arts and humanities program "Critique" on NET.

21.

However, John Charles Daly resigned after only five programs because the producing station of the program, Newark, New Jersey-licensed WNDT, declined to delete a remark by WCBS radio reporter David Goldman that John Charles Daly considered obscene from a taped program in the series titled "Huui, Huui," an opening production of the New York Shakespeare Festival Public Theater.

22.

John Charles Daly was a member of the Peabody Awards Board of Jurors from 1966 to 1982.

23.

John Charles Daly spent most of the 1980s as a frequent forum moderator for the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank.

24.

John Charles Daly married twice, first to Margaret Criswell Neal in January 1937.

25.

John Charles Daly died of cardiac arrest at his home in Chevy Chase, Maryland, on February 24,1991.