In two decades, Ed Bradley has gone from being a neighborhood radio reporter who chased "fires in the Bronx and water main breaks in Brooklyn" to one of the most trusted and recognized figures in broadcast journalism. The "60 Minutes" star has won six duPont Awards and 14 Emmys for his landmark reports on everything from schizophrenia to the 1923 massacre in Rosewood, Fla. We recently caught up with Bradley and up-and-coming St. Louis TV news reporter Cordell Whitlock at CBS News headquarters in New York. We were surprised to discover that Bradley, 60, who walks like he talks — with a cool, measured stride that breathes sagelike confidence — and Whitlock, 30, with NBC affiliate KSDK, actually have much in common. Both are Philly-born sports fanatics who love to cook. Whitlock is also Bradley's godson (they're not related) and an accomplished journalist in his own right. Here's their side of the story:
Bradley: I guess I was lucky or I came along at the right time, because I didn't see overt racial discrimination directed against me. I think that I was thrown into the soup, and someone said, 'Negro, sink or swim.' And I learned how to swim. From [the CBS bureau in] Paris, I went to Vietnam. I wasn't the first African-American reporter in Vietnam. Tom Johnson did a wonderful series in print for The New York Times that I remember reading before I left the States in the late '60s. And of course Jim Giggans went over for ABC News in the early '70s. But for all of that time I was in Vietnam, I was alone.
Whitlock: My first recollection of you was in the third grade. You took me to a White House press conference. There were all these lights and cameras and people, and I remember seeing Jimmy Carter walk into the room. When I was younger, the news was always on, either [John] Chancellor or [Walter] Cronkite. That was the first time I'd ever seen someone I'd watched on TV in real life. It was breathtaking, just blew me away. I also remember that after the press conference Sam Donaldson and Bob Schieffer were in the back teaching me card tricks, and I thought to myself, even at that young age, "You know, [Uncle Bradley's] got a pretty good gig." And then over the years I would visit you in New York. You got this job in 1981, and I remember it hadn't really hit me that you were working at "60 Minutes," and I was sitting in that chair right there [points to sofa in Bradley's office], and I was looking around, and I saw that nameplate [points through the glass wall of Bradley's office] that said "D. Rather." And I said, "Wait a minute." And then I looked, and the nameplate down here said "M. Safer." And another nameplate said "H. Reasoner." "He's at '60 Minutes!' " As I got older, I started going out on interviews and watching you work, and I just thought the nature of the [broadcast industry] was fascinating. For me, everything from about fourth grade on was geared toward TV news.
Bradley: I would say, just as a point of clarification, we're not related. His parents were among my best friends when I was in college [at Cheyney University near Philadelphia], and they asked me to be his godfather. And he just grew up calling me Uncle Bradley.
Whitlock: Something you always taught me is that somebody can look better than you, they can have more talent, but they can't outwork you. And if you're prepared and you're on your P's and Q's and your presentation is thorough, then it really doesn't matter if you're black, white, green or otherwise.
Bradley: What you've done at this point in your career couldn't have been done in my generation. You went from Philadelphia to North Augusta, S.C., to get a job. I went over to the Whitney Museum the other day to look at the Jacob Lawrence exhibit, and I looked at those 60-odd panels of the Negro Migration. [What you're doing] is sort of the reverse migration: Brother grows up in Philly and goes to South Carolina for his first job. I probably was too naive to be afraid [when I started out]; that's because there was no one really ahead of me as a trailblazer, specifically. I mean, I had nuns in school who always said to me, from the fourth grade on, "You can be whatever you want to be." I guess I believed them. Not that I'm the first African American in broadcasting. Certainly not. There were people who came before me. I can remember the first time I saw Mal Goode [the first black news reporter for a major network]. A lot of people probably didn't know Mal was black, but I knew. And I just thought that was so cool. But it never occurred to me that that would be something I wanted to do. I just thought, "Wow, black man, TV, United Nations."
Whitlock: We're taught as journalists that for every story you're supposed to show no bias. When it's appropriate, you're supposed to show both sides of the story. And let people decide at home what they think.
Bradley: It's not so much a feeling of being obligated [that I have to cover "black" stories]; it's what I'm trained to do. "You have a story here nobody's talking about. So let me tell you about this." As an example, I covered a group of welfare mothers in the late '60s to show what it took to live on a diet that amounted to about 99 cents a day. So I lived on that diet for a week. At the time, people were talking about "welfare queens." But the vast majority of people on welfare in New York City were not abusing it.
Whitlock: I'm proud to be an African-American journalist, but I don't walk into a newsroom thinking of myself as a black man on TV. I think of myself as a TV news reporter. And if that serves as being a role model and reflects positively on my race, then hey, I'm proud of that. What I focus on is doing the best job I can. In terms of racism, you're always going to have a segment of society that won't accept you, but I can't worry about that. I think it does help when you do have people of color, Asians, women; the more qualified reporters you have in your newsroom from different backgrounds, that's going to come across in your product, and that can't hurt. That can only help your overall presentation of the news. Because when you have someone of maybe Bosnian descent, yes, someone in the audience who has a similar background may identify more with them and they may listen more. The days of the all-WASP-male newsroom are over, and they should be over.
Bradley: When asked about progress, I'm often reminded of the old lady sitting in the church who says, "It ain't what it ought to be, but thank God it ain't what it used to be." To show you how it's changed, when I came to WCBS radio, I don't know how many hundreds of people worked there in all different capacities, but I was the only African American on the editorial staff. There was one radio engineer, Willie Brash. There was a woman who was a secretary. And there was Gus, who swept the floor. It was so bad that, several years after, when they hired another black reporter, the news director felt compelled to call me into his office and say, "I want you to know that we're happy with your work." I said, "Yeah, OK." And he said, "Well, you know we just hired so-and-so." I said, "What's that got to do with me?" He said, "Well, I didn't want you to feel threatened because we hired another one." But that was the reality in those days. So it's changed.
Whitlock: There are so many talented blacks in this profession. You look at the [National Association of Black Journalists] that was cofounded back in 1975 by Acel Moore, the Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist from Philadelphia, and their convention is a major event every year. You have thousands of people who attend that convention, and it's great to see so many of us doing well. The concern I do have is, it would be good to have more African Americans in management. Because as important as it is to see us in front of the camera, the decisions made behind the camera are just as crucial, if not more so. News directors, executive producers are integral parts of the operation, and a lot of the time they make the decisions as to what stories we cover. I'm hoping as the years go by we really see those numbers rise as well.
St. Louis TV reporter Cordell Whitlock, right, says, "I think of myself as a TV news reporter. And if that serves a being a role model and refelects positively on my race, then I'm proud of that."
— Photo by Matthew Jordan Smith for USA WEEKEND.