Jessica Savitch
Women may not have it easy, but we are given a fairer chance to reach for the top.Collection: Chance
Never refuse an assignment except when there is a conflict of interest, a potential of danger to you or your family, or you hold a strongly biased attitude about the subject under focus.Collection: Family
No matter how many goals you have achieved, you must set your sights on a higher one.Collection: Motivational
In interviews I gave early on in my career, I was quoted as saying it was possible to have it all: a dynamic job, marriage, and children. In some respects, I was a social adolescent.Collection: Marriage
You can easily die racing to cover a bank robbery as you can in a war zone.Collection: War
For every two minutes of glamour, there are eight hours of hard work.Collection: Work
It had not occurred to me that marriage requires the same effort as a career. And unlike a career, marriage requires a joint effort.Collection: Marriage
Many senators have developed a canny sense of what will play best for the audience.
I worked half my life to be an overnight success, and still it took me by surprise.
Television news is a delicate balance of serving public good and private gain.
It is my belief that one's salary is between an individual and the IRS.
The news anchor is exactly that - an anchor, a center, a focus.
When I was a little girl in the 1950s, it would not have been possible for me to say, I want to be an anchorwoman when I grow up.
The idea of stardom was difficult to grasp. It was like being schizophrenic; there was her, the woman on television, and the real me.
To get it first is important - but more important is to get it right.
When for so long you can't get a job for reasons that seem specious, you you finally do have it, you are constantly afraid of losing it.
The single life is not one I willingly chose for myself.
Women were seldom given quality assignments or adequate air time.
Women didn't want to watch other women on television because they were jealous of their husbands' diverted attention.
When I first anchored in 1970, I had never seen a woman anchor a news show.
What is the value of sticking a microphone in a man's face right after he has learned of his wife's death?
Walking into a room filled with people you don't know but who know you brings out your worst vulnerabilities.
The relationship between talent and management is uneasy, at best.
The most important event I covered was the Panama Canal debate, which dragged on for months.
The minute viewers callin or write about your looks, they were not listening to what you were saying.
The latest wrinkle is on wrinkles. There is a widespread belief that women can't grow old in television news.
The code of the road is, if there is anything to eat, eat; if there is a place to sit, sit; if there is a restroom, go.
The better the coverage, the more discriminating the viewer.
The bad news is that 50 people died in a hotel fire; the good news is that we got exclusive footage.
Texas was defined by its larger-than-life characters, particularly politicians.
Television is intensely personal.
Some news managers have been slow to grasp that good television news is always substance over form.
Shootouts are not gunfights of honor, they're gang wars and racial riots.
Our free enterprise system of disseminating information is collectively referred to as The Media. But there is no collective.
One reason I left local news was that I was tired of the constant musical chairs among news directors.
Newscasters cannot call attention to themselves by being too attractive or too unattractive.
News reporting is a cycle: No matter how much you work at sending a message, it's only successful if it's received.
News events cannot be controlled, nor can newscasts be mapped out like entertainment shows.
News events are like Texas weather. If you don't like it, wait a minute.
My most lucrative job in college was a stint as the regional Dodge Girl.
My goal was to be a network correspondent by the time I was 30.
My current goal is to place a moratorium on goals.
Mistakes are not always the result of someone's ineptitude.
Men still control the news, both on and off camera.
In the beginning, my mother humored me when I told her I wanted to be a reporter.
In real life, events seem much less dramatic.
In every interview I have ever read or seen or taken part in, the final question in our future-oriented society is always, What next?
I very much wanted to be accepted by my peers, to be considered a serious journalist.
I have had a lifelong phobia of snakes.
I hadn't realized until I covered the police beat just how seedy crime is.