Remembering Charles Kuralt
(Our State, Down Home Living In North Carolina, September 1997)

Like many Americans, I was shocked to hear the news: Charles Kuralt, dead at the age of 62. A little more than two years ago, I spent an hour talking with the former CBS anchor for a magazine article I was writing. It was the highlight of my career and an event that deeply touched me.

Kuralt was, to me, the quintessential American, not because of the way he looked or the way he carried himself but because of the way he felt about America. Having watched him on TV on Sunday mornings, having read his books and later having spoken with him, I knew that more than anything else, he believed that America was still good and strong and decent, and, perhaps more importantly, that the notion of patriotism wasn't such a bad thing after all.

On television and in his writings, Kuralt informed us that America was "more just, more neighborly and more humane" than it used to be. "The country that I have found does not bear much resemblance to the one we read about on the front pages of newspapers or hear about on the evening news," Kuralt said to me in his familiar voice. "The country that I found presents cups of coffee and slices of apple pie and people who always want you to stay longer than you have time to."

Visiting the various hamlets along America's backroads had indeed given Kuralt a great deal to be reassured about. He met many Americans who were involved in purposes that he says were "decent and compassionate and unsullied by arrogance or hostility toward other people or delusions of superiority or motives of greed." These were people who really cared about their communities and their country. Their only motives were to help make America a better place to live. "It's what we used to call patriotism before that became such an old-fashioned word," Kuralt said.

To illustrate his point, he related a story about Montana-native Gordon Bushnell. "Mr Bushnell always thought there ought to be a straight highway from Duluth to Fargo, and the state would not build it," Kuralt said. "So about 25 years ago, he decided that he was just going to have to build it himself."

All alone, with a number-two shovel, an old wheelbarrow and an ancient John Deere tractor, Bushnell began to negotiate with people for the right to build a road across their land. "When we met him he had finished 11 miles of road, had 180 miles to go-of course, he was 78 years old at the time," Kuralt said with a chuckle. "But I loved him, and he just pressed on, because he knew it was the right thing to do."

Talking to Kuralt, I got the impression that despite the cynicism of the time, he still believed that Americans have an inherent sense of knowing the right thing to do. I was deeply moved by his love for the people of this nation. Kuralt's America was, in fact, one of concerned citizens, of good and decent people. He inspired me, as I'm sure he inspired everyone, with his entertaining stories of goodness. He was a Panglossian fellow, believing that we lived in the best of all possible worlds. And perhaps we do. I know that for me the desperate world became less desperate when Kuralt framed events in his broad historical perspective. He had the gift, perhaps more than any reporter, of seeing the big picture.

He told us that maybe, just maybe, we were all better off than we had thought we were. No progress in race relations? Kuralt recalled the time when four black students sat down at a Woolworth's lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, until they were served a Coke. "I never thought I would live to see the day of genuine racial justice in the part of the country I come from," said the North Carolina-native. "I'm about to believe that I am going to live to see that day."

Kuralt succeeded in convincing me that we are better off than we used to be, even though our self-pity may be greater. He told me the story of how, on an airplane flight in the spring of 1993, a young graduate sitting beside him began to talk about how this must be the worst time in America to be graduating and looking for a job. Kuralt said he silently recalled how in the 1930s his father, a recent college graduate, set out looking for a job and, after six months of searching, found one: creosoting telephone poles in eastern North Carolina. "I didn't say anything to the young graduate," Kuralt told me, "but I thought, Didn't they teach you any history in that great university of yours?"

Kuralt's America was one of self-reliant, self-determining, problem-solving people. National conscience was more than a concept to him. It was something real, "a naive idea," he said, "but one that we really believe in," and one that we cannot shake. "The idea we adhere to is a very appealing one to me," he said. "It is that there is a solution to every problem. Let something go wrong in America, and you can be sure somebody will form a committee. Next thing you know people are at work on the problem just as if there really were a solution to it. It's the most appealing thing of all to me about our fellow citizens."

In his lifetime, various "handfuls of people, willing to be ridiculed," stood up for what they believed. Their perseverance, he added, succeeded in raising awareness about our environment, women's rights, racial equality and other national concerns. "It still amazes me that even in this big, complex society, one man or one woman can make all the difference."

I thought Charles Kuralt would live forever. I wished he had lived longer. That his death will be remembered on the birthday of the country he loved is fitting.

"If you could have been on the journey with me to every corner of every state over and over again, I think you would agree that people of all races and ages and conditions care for their country more than they used to. They have come to see the grace and worth and joy in taking part themselves in solving our problems and becoming a part of the national conscience. I think there are grounds for modest self congratulations in the history of our country during my years as a reporter."

Thank you Charles Kuralt. We will miss you dearly.