SMNTY Classics: The View on Barbara Walters

In this classic episode, Cristen and Caroline discuss the legacy of Barbara Walters as a pioneering female broadcast journalist and soft-news aficionado, and why TIME magazine called her the "Most Appalling Argument for Feminism."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hey, this is Anny and Samantha and Welcome to Stuff
I Never Told You Protection by Heart Radio. I don't
know if you feel this way, Samantha, And maybe I'm
just I don't know, I'm getting older, but I feel

(00:26):
like we lost a lot of people in two, like
especially towards the end of Yeah, at the end of
the beginning, I feel like a lot of death for
being announced and I was like, oh no, yeah, yeah,
like big iconic figures. So unfortunately, we have a couple

(00:46):
of classics coming up about some of those people. But
we're going to start with Barbara Walters, who died at
the end of two and just like with most people
we talked about, that's sort of a you know, looking back,
some things we can talk about that we're problematic for sure,
but was an icon and was a trailblazer in terms

(01:07):
of journalism. Uh, kind of that soft focus journalism is
still a thing that people reference. But yeah, we wanted
to bring back this classic episode about Barbara Walters and
and all the things that she did, so please enjoy.
Welcome to Stuff Mom Never Told You. From House toff

(01:28):
Works dot Com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Kristen and I'm Caroline, and today we are devoting our
episode to Barbara Walters, legendary news anchor and soft news personality.

(01:49):
How do you describe Barbara Walters, host, current host of
The View. I guess she's a personality journalism extraordinaire. That
is a great title for her. I will I will
air brush her a T shirt that on it if
you want nice and I hope that her face on
it would have that air brushed soft look as it
does now. Yes. Um, yeah, Barbara Walters recently announced that

(02:15):
she is retiring, not just from the View but from journalism,
from TV, etcetera. And she's eighty three years old, which
makes it even more awesome that she initially made the
announcement via Twitter, right yeah. And and she's no dummy,
that Barbara Walters. She's she's pretty media savvy, as one

(02:35):
would expect from somebody who's been in the industry for
as long as she has. But she made this Twitter
announcement uh the night before her a big official announcement
on the View on May thirteen, and coincidentally or not,
it's during sweeps week, right, And so she says she's
gonna retire in and she's been on television continuously for

(03:00):
over fifty years in different capacities, mostly on ABC and NBC,
and we wanted to take an episode to talk about
her because she was such a groundbreaking woman in broadcast
television and now with her legacy, there's there's a little
bit of controversy, but we wanted to take a take

(03:22):
a moment to talk about her highlights and why Barbara
Walters really does matter. Yeah, she's had some pretty significant firsts,
and two that go hand in hand are the fact
that she was the first female co host over on
ABC News. She co hosted with Harry Reasoner, who really
sounds like a jerk. And when she was offered this

(03:44):
co hosting position, she became the first female anchor to
make a million bucks. Yeah, and before that, she had
become the first female co host of The Today Show
as well, which was where she really got her start. Um.
And before that, when she went to work for in
BC in the early sixties, she started out as a
secretary and then quickly worked her way up the ranks,

(04:06):
and from nineteen sixty one to nineteen seventy four she
was a reporter, a writer, and a panel member for
The Today Show and at that time that when she
was on the show, they had a token female on
there called the Today Girl, who was usually a model
or an actress. So when Walters was tapped to become

(04:29):
a new Today Girl, it was a big deal because
she said, I wasn't beautiful, and I had trouble pronouncing
my rs, and I had no idea that they would
want me for this, but of course she jumped on it, right,
And the Today Girl slot was usually filled by models,
her actresses, women who basically covered light, fluffy lifestyle pieces

(04:50):
because at the time, she said, you know, nobody was
going to take a woman seriously reading the news, and
so they kind of were relegated to the background doing
fluffier pieces. Didn't you call it something like the tea
pouring stories? Right? Yeah? And this maker's video that that
was produced by PBS and a O L. She she
did call them tea pouring interviews. She said that for years,

(05:12):
but Today show had one female writer out of something
like seven and the only way basically that you could
get the job is off another female writer got married
or died, and then they would hire literally one other
female writer to do the quote unquote female pieces, which
she called you know, the fashion shows, the celebrity interviews.
Uh So she ended up doing that because it was

(05:32):
all she could do. And I didn't realize this, but
in nineteen seventy Barbara Walters published her first book, which
was called How To Talk with Practically Anybody About Practically Anything.
Because she made a name for herself pretty much off
the bat with her interviewing style. She was always able
to get notable interviews as well talk about a little
bit more and kind of developed a signature style. And

(05:57):
in nineteen seventy two, as sings, NBC are really starting
to pick up for her. Just to give you a snapshot,
Barbara Walters told Time Magazine in nineteen quote, the only
woman with a daily network show is Dinah Shore, and
she sings, I'd like to do evening news specials like
the men do. A female anchor woman on the nightly

(06:17):
news hasn't happened yet either. It's like she knew what
was going to happen. And that proved to be a
very preseent quote, because she broke those barriers. She did
that stuff. But first, in nineteen seventy four to nineteen
seventy six, she became the co host on the Today Show.

(06:38):
But it took the death of this guy named Frank
McGhee who was one of the host for her to
actually be named co host because when she was on
the Today Show, Frank McGee was so opposed to a
woman being at an equal level of him because it
just was unheard of at the time that it wasn't

(06:59):
into he died that she was able to step in
and tell her bosses, hey, you know what, according to
my contract, I am a co host and you need
to call me a co host. And then in nineteen
seventy five, she snagged her first Daytime Emmy, which was
not for the Today Show, but for this show called
Not for Women Only that she hosted that I believe

(07:20):
was based in New York. It might have just been
on New York channels, but it was kind of thing
where she would invite women on to talk about what
they were doing. It was a little bit feminist, um,
and that's where she kind of first semi well, you know,
she has known for her interviewing style and she developed
it out of sheer scrappiness. This woman was pushed aside

(07:44):
so often that she often had to go outside of
normal methods of interviewing people. If she wanted an interview
in those days that she was co hosting and kind
of relegated to just the woman's stories, if she wanted
one that was totally her, she had to literally go
outside of the studios so that she wouldn't have to
wait for the men to ask the interview questions. Because

(08:05):
when after she had become a staple on the Today
Show alongside people like Hugh Downs and Frank McGee, uh,
she was restricted from asking questions of the show's quote
unquote serious guests until the male co host had had
asked his. That was an actual role that the dude
had come up with, and so she had to clear
her own paths. She said, Uh, they became mine, the

(08:28):
interviews that she did outside of the studio, which she said,
is how she got her reputation as an interviewer and
a pushy cookie. A pushy cookie indeed, But in April twenty,
nineteen seventy six, not only was she a pushy cookie,
but Barbara Walters was a self described lonely cookie. Because
when that was when she got that groundbreaking co anchor

(08:49):
job on ABC World News Tonight, and she was at
the top of her game at the time, but also
comple lately despairing and almost depressed about it because whenever
she would walk into the studio and this was from
that maker's interview on PBS, she talks about how no
one wanted to talk to her. The mostly male staff

(09:14):
and Harry reason and her co host, wanted absolutely nothing
to do with her. They would make jokes about her
because they thought it was ludicrous that a woman was
co anchoring, can you believe it? But the funny thing
is though she was making more than Harry Reasoner when
she first got in there. She snagged that record one
million dollar contract, and half a million was for the
co anchoring job, and half a million was for her

(09:36):
interview specials, which was really more so than that job
at ABC World News Tonight. It was her interview specials
that became her hallmark. Right. But you know what, just
like Harry Reasoner didn't accept her, viewers didn't either, and
journalists called her a flop. And she even says that,
you know, she was so hurt, and she actually asked

(09:59):
the journalist who write the story, you know you called
me a flop? What why why did you do that?
And he said, well, you are and within two years
of becoming the co anchor with Harry Reasoner, she was
reassigned to do specials and Reasoner was actually let out
of his contract to go to another network. And Barbara said,
you know, they could have kept him, but they bet
on me. And she said it was during this time
that she worked the hardest and did probably the best

(10:21):
interviews of her life, which included people like Fidel Castro
in the very famous joint interview with Manacum Bagan and
and Arsadat. And quickly going back to that short stint
that she had at ABC World News tonight, when I
was reading about her struggle managing all of the criticism,
it gave me a little bit of perspective for if

(10:43):
I have a bad day, if someone sends us Carolina
maybe not so nice email, I need to remember Barbara
Walters and all of the flak that she was getting
at the time. For instance, Larry Flint offered her a
million dollars to pose for Hustler whatever. But then in
nineteen seventies six Time magazine called her the quote unquote

(11:05):
most appalling argument for feminism. Uh, there was Guilder Radner's
famous Saturday Night Live impression of her baba wah wah,
which she was. She knew that it was a joke,
but it was also offensive because everyone was making fun
of how she spoke, right. She really did not like it.
And she even said in that video that she caught

(11:26):
her daughter watching the Impression on TV and said, what
are you doing? Why are you watching that stuff? And
her ten year old turns around and says, home, mom,
have a sense of humor. And she said, Okay, I
get it. But even then it was still so hard
to accept, right. And and even later on Barbara Walters
ended up meeting Gilda Radner and she was very friendly
and all of that, but can you imagine being a

(11:48):
national punch line when at the same time you're at
the top of your game? Right? Well, what she said
saved her during that really dark time was letters from
women that came pouring in, things like if you can
do it, we can do it. Hang in there, We're
having the same problems. And she said, I really realized

(12:08):
that women from all walks of life understood what I
was going through and they were with me. Yeah. And
so even though today when we think about Barbara Walters
and we think about the view and it isn't exactly
hard hitting news. It might not have the brainiest reputation,
but looking at this snapshot of her early career, and

(12:31):
not even that early. She was forty five years old
when she got that job at ABC World News Tonight, Um,
it still speaks so much to the ambition and tenacity
that she had, and when she was struggling with these
these networks, she said that a lot of times she
wasn't one to elbow her way into a vice president's
office and demand things. She said that I just wanted

(12:53):
to do the work. And that was the way that
she snagged all of those interviews, those famous interviews like
the ones that you mentioned, and also the that she
interviewed in Richard Nixon and has interviewed every single sitting
president since then. She had that famous interview with Monica Lewinsky,
which is still the most watched interview in television history.

(13:14):
And it's incredible to think that she was still able
to do all this stuff, still able to keep all
this momentum, even when you know, major media outlets are
basically telling her to go home already. Yeah, well, so

(13:35):
what sparked this drive? I mean, obviously she has incredible drive,
and like you said, this tenacity to keep pressing on
in the face of oh everyone, And she credits not
necessarily her parents supporting her, but her parents not directly
supporting her. She said, you know, I didn't have parents
who said you can do everything you want. What I
did have was a father who was in show business

(13:57):
and my fear that it could all be gone tomorrow.
And then I had to work. If the job was grubby.
I could not say I'm going to leave it and
get married because I wasn't very good at that and
I didn't want to have that as my safety net.
I had to work. And Barbara Walters was married three times,
four times if you count the second time she remarried
her third husband and carry the one. But um, you know,

(14:20):
as far as like that tenacity and that that not
giving up and having to work being a woman in
that era who is like, no, I'm gonna work, Screw you,
I'm not going to fall back on marriage. I mean,
it's interesting in the perspective of is she a feminist?
What did she do for the women's movement? Because she
did want to help other women, and she did want
to put a focus in the news on the women's movement,

(14:42):
but there was a bit of a pushback she had
sent when she worked very early in her career at NBC.
She had sent a memo to the NBC president asking
shouldn't we do something on this whole this whole little
trend going on right now, the women's movement, and his
response scrawled on the top of the memo, was not
enough in tryst. And nevertheless, so she you know, she

(15:04):
still made such a big impact. There was a blog
post over at A A r P by Laurie Lynch
and she said it was her ceiling shattering move to
ABC in nineteen seventies six to co host and nightly
news that really made young women sit up and take notice.
Those of us aspiring to big careers in journalism were
being told by mentors and mothers that we two could

(15:25):
be another Barbara Walters. And I mean, from that perspective,
that's pretty incredible. I think probably for you and I.
We both went to journalism school, and I don't think
that Barbara Walters was ever mentioned really in any of
the classes we took, because by that time, you know,
maybe we just sort of take her for granted, as

(15:46):
you know, popping up on and having the view. I
mean she start I didn't realize this, but she launched
her famous ten Most Fascinating People special in n and
the view launched when she was V and D. Yeah,
I just like that kind of blew my mind because
I guess I just think of the view as having
started when I was much older. Apparently not. But I mean,

(16:10):
as far as you know, the women's movement, she might
not have directly associated with it or with feminism, but
she certainly didn't turn her back on it, which you know,
is what Patricia Bradley said in her book Mass Media
and the Shaping of American Feminism, where she actually talked
to a lot of other female journalists from this era
who said, you know, I remember Barbara being like so

(16:31):
friendly and always offering a hand and wanting to help,
which is something that Barbara herself confirmed in that maker's video.
You know, she said, I tried to be very supportive
of women because I know what I went through and
women do need that help. And it is still a
little difficult for men to understand it. The fact that
we still have the same poll between the career and

(16:52):
the child and the marriage. Yes, she said, men do
to a degree, but not the same way that women do. Yeah.
And in two thousand twelve, she definitely raised some hackles
among feminists and just viewers in general who were kind
of confused when she, on the View publicly sided with

(17:12):
conservative Rick Santorum's comment that quote unquote, radical feminism was
ruining the traditional family. And let's not even waste the
time like diving into that assertion. Um. But on the view,
she I mean, she really made people a bit angry
because she said, quote, there was a time when feminists

(17:33):
made the woman who stayed home and had children feel inferior.
I think we are finally changing so that we realized
younger ones you can make a choice. So I don't
think that what he said is so terribly off the point.
And that's a strong move to say, hey, you know
what I'm gonna I'm gonna side with you, Rick santorm
especially if you might be more associated with slightly more

(17:57):
liberal politics. But that really isn't different from what she
was saying during the height of second wave feminism. Um.
For instance, in there's a nineteen four book, I Found
the New Feminist Movement, and she was quoted as saying
that second wave feminist quote have given women who want
to stay home a national inferiority complex, And thinking about that,

(18:21):
I understand what she's saying in terms of it shouldn't
be demonizing women who want to stay home. It should
be more about the choice. Perhaps in two thousand twelve
of the way that she said it and the person
that she was supporting as she was saying that was
really more of the problem for people, right. But I mean,
I think it's interesting and I think it's I don't know,

(18:44):
just coming that statement coming from a woman who obviously
did make the choice and felt like she had to
make the choice, Like she said, I had to work.
I didn't want to fall back on marriage or any
kind of safety net, you know, because her father had
been in show business, he was a nightclub owner. It
all it be gone in a second, and she knew that,
and so she wanted to keep working, you know, keep
being as successful as possible, make her contribution. And so

(19:08):
the fact that she's the one coming forward and saying,
you feminists are giving women who want to stay at
home and raise babies and inferiority complex, I mean, I
think that gives it maybe some extra weight. Yeah, And
I wonder if that speaks to pressure that she had
felt it points during her career that maybe she should
stay home with her adoptive daughter at least stepped back
a little bit. How um, you could keep Barbara walters

(19:31):
intense schedule and also, uh, you know, be a full
time mom, but that just seems pretty impossible. Um. But
you know, Barbara certainly has not been without her controversy.
Once she announced her retirement in May, everybody came out with,

(19:52):
you know, a blog post or an article or something
on Barbara saying good riddance or oh Barbara well ms
and Alex s Perrine, for instance, over at Salon was
one of the people who said good riddance because he
said she's fine for infotainment, but she has no journalistic
scruples whatsoever because of her very close he thinks, two

(20:15):
close relationships over the years with sources, some of whom
were just a tad corrupt, such as most recently Syrian
President Bashar al Assa, who um she had on I
had I can't remember if it was on twenty, but
she had one of the first interviews with him, and
Marene was talking about how well, of course you got

(20:36):
the interview because she's actually good friends with him and
his wife, and and talking about other um usually actually
men for the most part, that she had been friends
with but also would interview or use as as sources. Yeah,
and one thing I read was talking about how maybe
that that comfort with extremely famous or infamous people, that

(20:58):
that ease of interviewing all sorts of people from all
different walks of life comes from her upbringing because her
father was in show business, and because she had been
in some form of journalism for so long. And Yeah,
she has walked that infotainment tightrope for decades. You know,
she's able to jump between interviews with heads of state
and celebrities like the you know, the Kardashians, or that

(21:19):
infamous Ricky Martin interview where she was basically like demanding
that he come out of the closet on her show
and he's like, look, I don't want to talk about it.
I mean, she was pretty vilified for for that at
the time. Yeah, And also on Salon she just kind
of on the flip side of the controversy. TV critic
Mary Elizabeth Williams said, you know what I am all

(21:42):
about some Barbara Walters. She says that, yeah, Okay, she's
got the soft focus, she's got the entottainment spin and
all of that quote, but what she leaves behind is
a ferociously powerful, maddening, lee unduplicated example. She's a woman
who out earned many of her male counterparts and has
been ashamed and unapologetic about her aspirations. Yeah and uh

(22:05):
over at the Cut from New York Magazine, they wrote
that Barbara has served as a bridge between an era
when the news was defined by a small, homogeneous group
of experts to a time when discussion and conversation rain.
And I think her career has totally mirrored that trajectory
as far as like starting out wanting to be in
hard news talking to heads of state, whereas now she's

(22:26):
hosting a talk show basically right. And that's not to
say that the View never touches on political stories, harder news,
bigger societal issues. Um, but you know it's still it's
definitely it's not c SPAN. Yeah sure, I mean yeah,
I mean she's not just sitting there talking like Brian

(22:49):
Williams delivering the news at night. You know, it's it's
four four or five or however many people are on
the View sitting around on a couch talking versus the
more serious like Walter Cronkite. Who do you think will
replace her? Anybody? Do you think they'll do? You think
they'll pull in a replacement. Who's somebody with some gravitas?
Martha Stewart. She's looking for a new gig right All

(23:10):
she's doing is dating on match dot com right now.
And yeah, I'm getting into trouble for selling her spatchel
as at different stories Martha, No spatialists now. Maybe, um,
let's make our prediction. The person who will take over
for Barbara Walters in two thousand fourteen won't be Katie

(23:30):
Currect because after she got the shaft, she she has
her own talk show now and it's successful. And I
don't think that it would be Diane Sawyer maybe and Curry.
I don't think it would be and Curry. I don't
think it would be and Curry. But you know what
if it were and Curry, I might watch the view
because of her unceremonious exit from the Today Show. Uh So.

(23:53):
But just to sign off, though, should we toss out
some final accolades that Barbara Walters has received over the years.
Listen to this nominated for seven Daytime Emmy Awards, she's
won four times, nominated for twenty News and Documentary Emmy
Awards and won eight times, and then nominated for twelve
Prime Time Emmy's and one one time. So let me

(24:16):
look at this maths on everything thirteen Emmy's not bad,
not bad, not bad, Babs. I wonder if she has
a cabinet, an Emmy cabinet, or maybe she just sprinkles
them around. You know, she puts one in each of
her thirteen bathrooms in her home. Yeah, one in each shower. Yes,
So that's it, Barbara Walters. Hats off for you too,

(24:40):
um really never giving up and also still though I
want to say that lover her hater. What a great example, though,
of a woman who is well beyond retirement age, who
never stopped working now and and I do like what
she said when she retired. You know, I just I
just want to it on a hill and watch everything happen,

(25:02):
you know, just watch it go by. I mean, after
after being on television for over fifty years, I think
she deserves a vacation. Yeah, you wonder if her attitude
is still the same today as it was then. As
far as I have to work because obviously, I mean,
she's been pretty consistently successful for decades now, like I
think she's set. Yeah, I mean, Barbara Walters is as

(25:23):
much of a celebrity and an a lister as most
of the people that she talks to at this point.
So let's hear from folks, Barbara Walters, what do you
think any predictions for who will take over at the View?
I know it's kind of a silly question, but it's
a fun one. So right to us mom Stuff at

(25:45):
Discovery dot com, or you can tweet us set mom
Stuff podcasts, or send us a little message on Facebook
and like us while you're at it. And we are
going to read a couple of letters that we have
from past episode. But before we do, let's take a
quick break and then we'll get right back. And now

(26:08):
that to our letters, and we've got a couple here
about our episode on Glass of Stereotypes, which we got
a ton of letters from. And this one to kick
off from Carmen is a little bit sad. Her subject
line is how I learned glasses are bad? She says,
when I was in elementary school, I wore glasses because

(26:28):
I was scared of putting things in my eyes. But
in the sixth grade, I was at school one day
and two girls on the other side of the classroom
we're talking about me. One of them said, that's Carmen
over there, the ugly one with the glasses. I found
out about this conversation because the girl who said that
was one of my closest friends, and she simply told
me what she had said, as if she saw no

(26:48):
problem with calling me ugly. I told my mom I
wanted context as soon as I got home that day.
At the end of that school year, at my middle school,
boyfriend saw my yearbook picture, which had been taken before
I got context, and he immediately told me, I like
you better with contacts. Middle school's worse. I'm probably old
enough now that no one would ever call me ugly

(27:08):
to my face, but I still hate the idea of
wearing glasses. I'll soon be leaving to work in a
developing country for two years, and did not want to
deal with the hassle bringing eight parents of daily contacts
with me, or being in a situation where I'm spending
a night in a village without a sink for me
to change my contacts. So in two days, I'll beating
lay six surgery after four years of wearing glasses and
eleven years were in contacts. It's possible that I would

(27:30):
have gotten the surgery anyway, because both glasses and contacts
can be incredibly inconvenient times. But certainly the negative stereotypes
contributed a great deal to my enthusiasm for having lasers
shot into my eyes and the name of eliminating my
need for corrective lenses. Yeah. I have friends have done
life second, they love it. I'm I'm too scared. I'm

(27:51):
too scared period. Okay, Well, I have a letter here
from Chelsea. She says, I've been wearing glasses for twenty
one years since I was six, and you. I wear
my contact of the time. I have exceptionally awful vision,
and I've been legally blind since an early age. I
definitely played into the stereotype of the dorky girl in school,
which was reflected in my lack of a dating life

(28:12):
until college. So I was not surprised to hear your
findings in the podcast. I was surprised, however, that nothing
was mentioned about being genetically inferior. I always assumed that
people with glasses were subconsciously found less attractive because of
some primeval knowledge that poor eyesight equates death. I always
assumed I would have died early on if I was
born before eyeglasses were invented, Much like with my lack

(28:36):
of child bearing hips and bountiful breasts. I would also
assume that people would not want to breed with someone
who is likely to pass on their poor eyesight to
their offspring. Did you find anything relating to that in
your research? We did not uncover anything like that, But
I don't know. Yeah, I on a slightly related note

(28:58):
that doesn't answer your question at all. So I recently
found this book, uh, that was a compilation of my
great great great great great great uncle's letters to his family,
because he went went to Dartmouth, went to law school,
and ended up dying in the Civil War. Like at
the very end in anyway, his beloved sister compiled all
his letters, and in so many of his letters when
he's off at college, he's writing home and he's like

(29:20):
mother and father. I can barely see as I write
you this letter, my eyes. And he's always concerned about
his eyes. And he's always looking forward to Christmas break
and summer breaks off, so that he can rest his
eyes because he's like, I'm afraid I will need glasses
oh mine. And he was also very skinny, so that
means nothing. But it's very interesting to read a firsthand

(29:42):
account of someone in the eighteen when was that college.
I don't know for him, but who was scared of
getting glasses? And if only if only Warby Parker existed
back then, he'd be the most stylish chap at dot
I mean he had to killer mustache. There you go, Wow,
he's he had everything he needed just right there. He

(30:03):
just needed some some thick frames. Well. Thanks to everyone
who has written into us. Mom Stuff at discovery dot
com is where you can send your letters. You can
also follow us on Twitter at mom Stuff Podcasts, and
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