Eyewitness News where Beutel gave a brief commentary on an issue of the day, usually a brief summary of the newscast in one minute or less. In the latter role he was given a segment called "Final Thought", which aired at the end of the 6 p.m. anchor, and Beutel spent the final two years of his career serving as a senior correspondent and occasional commentator. In 2001 Ritter also replaced Beutel as the 6 p.m. newscast in 1999 and was replaced by ABC News correspondent Bill Ritter. After Tong left WABC in 1991 Beutel anchored with Susan Roesgen for one year, but the pairing was unsuccessful and in 1992 Roesgen was replaced by Diana Williams. Eyewitness News in 1989 after Ernie Anastos left to join WCBS and was originally paired with then-longtime co-anchor Kaity Tong. co-anchor Diana Williams joined him in 1999. In 1990 Beutel began a long stint anchoring the 6 p.m. by Kaity Tong and John Johnson in a rotating anchor arrangement and was permanently joined by Johnson beginning in 1988. After Grimsby's firing, Beutel was joined at 6:00 p.m. However, within a year, WABC-TV had shot back to first place and has been the ratings leader in New York ever since. Though the ratings drop was mostly associated with ABC-TV's poor primetime performance during that time, it led to Grimsby's firing in 1986. The reformed Grimsby-Beutel team kept Eyewitness News on top of the ratings through the middle 1980s, when it briefly fell to last place. Beutel returned to WABC-TV and Eyewitness News, though he maintained a presence on the network as the anchor of its 15-minute late newscasts on Saturday and Sunday nights through the late 1970s. AM America was replaced on Novemby Good Morning America, originally anchored by David Hartman and Nancy Dussault. This show, ABC's first attempt at a morning news program to compete with NBC's Today and CBS's combination of network news and Captain Kangaroo, lasted only ten months on the air. On January 6, 1975, Beutel was reassigned by ABC News and became the co-host (along with Stephanie Edwards) of a new morning show called AM America. The two worked together for 16 years, most of which was spent going back and forth with WCBS-TV for first place in the New York ratings. īeutel rejoined WABC-TV on Septemas Grimsby's co-anchor on Eyewitness News. Since Grimsby had already established a powerful presence after just two years in New York, Primo wanted a co-anchor "who could be his own man." Beutel assured Primo he could be. Primo remembered Beutel's solo anchor run in the early 1960s. He wanted Beutel to return to New York as co-anchor alongside Roger Grimsby, whom Primo hired away from KGO-TV to serve as WABC-TV's main anchor. Primo had brought the Eyewitness News format, in which the reporters directly presented their stories, along with him from KYW-TV in Philadelphia. In 1970, he got a call from Al Primo, who had taken over as news director at WABC after Beutel left. 2 Beutel left his WABC duties for two years in April 1968 to join ABC News full-time as their London bureau chief. Among the hundreds of famous personages who were interviewed by Beutel was the African American Muslim and black nationalist leader Malcolm X. That expansion was not without risk however, and the new format struggled in the ratings. WABC-TV built on its three-year ratings success with newscast Report to New York anchored by Scott Vincent, and expanded the format to a one-hour 6:00 p.m. Television career īeutel moved to ABC on Octoas a reporter with ABC News and as anchor at the network's New York flagship, WABC-TV. His first radio job was in Cleveland before moving to CBS Radio in New York City in 1957. Murrow a letter saying, "I very much wanted to be a radio journalist." Beutel received a letter back advising him to go to the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. While Beutel was in law school, he wrote Edward R. After a stint in the Army, Beutel graduated from Dartmouth College and then studied law at the University of Michigan Law School, though he left without obtaining his degree.