On this day in 1921, former NBC news host (Today show) & anchor Frank McGee was born in Oklahoma City. He succumbed to bone cancer at age 55. Born in Monroe in Ouachita Parish, Louisiana, and raised in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, McGee began his broadcast news career at WKY-TV (now KFOR-TV) in his hometown. In 1955, the owners of WKY purchased WSFA-TV in Montgomery, Alabama, and sent McGee there as news director. WSFA was an affiliate of NBC. As the civil rights movement gained national coverage, McGee's work came to the notice of NBC, which offered him a position with the network. He went on to become "one of television's most prominent newsmen."[1]
McGee was a floor correspondent for the national conventions of both political parties in 1960, 1964, and 1968, one member of the so-called "Four Horsemen" that included NBC newsmen John Chancellor, Edwin Newman, and Sander Vanocur. In 1960, he hosted the second debate between presidential candidates John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon. At that time, the debates were considered by the news media to have swung the election in favor of Kennedy.
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