1200am. Just in from ABC News:

ABC News Anchor Peter Jennings died today at his home in New York City. He was 67. On April 5, Jennings announced he had been diagnosed with lung cancer.

He is survived by his wife Kayce Freed, his two children, Elizabeth, 25, and Christopher, 23, and his sister Sarah Jennings.

Jennings, who announced in April that he had lung cancer, died at his New York home, ABC News President David Westin said.

“Peter has been our colleague, our friend, and our leader in so many ways. None of us will be the same without him,” Westin said.

CNN:

Jennings, a native Canadian who became a U.S. citizen in 2003, said he would continue to host “World News Tonight” when possible. Since the announcement, ABC News’ Charles Gibson and Elizabeth Vargas have filled in for him as temporary anchors.

But he said he was determined to fight the disease, citing National Cancer Institute statistics that nearly 10 million Americans are living with cancer. “I have a lot to learn from them, and ‘living’ is the key word,” he said.

Since April 5, when Jennings announced his diagnosis on the news program, he kept his public comments positive. Even during the initial announcement, he said he would be undergoing chemotherapy and joked about losing his hair.

“I wonder if other men and women ask their doctors right away, ‘OK, doc, when does the hair go?’” said the immaculately dressed and coifed Jennings.

He admitted being a smoker until about 20 years ago, and said he “was weak and I smoked over 9/11.”

AP/USA Today:

Broadcasting was the family business for Jennings. His father, Charles Jennings, was the first person to anchor a nightly national news program in Canada and later became head of the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.’s news division. A picture of his father was displayed prominently in Jennings’ office off ABC’s newsroom.

Charles Jennings’ son had a Saturday morning radio show in Ottawa at age 9. Jennings never completed high school or college, and began his career as a news reporter at a radio station in Brockton, Ontario. He quickly earned an anchor job at Canadian Television.

Sent south to cover the Democratic national convention in 1964, the handsome, dashing correspondent was noticed by ABC’s news president. Jennings was offered a reporting job and left Canada for New York.

As the third-place news network, ABC figured its only chance was to go after young viewers. Jennings was picked to anchor the evening news and debuted on Feb. 1, 1965. He was 26.

“It was a little ridiculous when you think about it,” Jennings told author Barbara Matusow. “A twenty-six-year-old trying to compete with Cronkite, Huntley and Brinkley. I was simply unqualified.”

Critics savaged him as a pretty face unfit for the promotion. Using the Canadian pronunciations for some words and once misidentifying the Marine Corps’ anthem as “Anchors Aweigh” didn’t help his reputation. The experiment ended three years later.

He later described the humbling experience as an opportunity, “because I was obliged to figure out who I was and what I really wanted to be.”

Blogger memorials and commentary…

Michael King: “He was a good guy, and at least I, for one, am sorry to see him depart this life at his age. Godspeed, PJ, and thanks for the memories.”

Karen at The View From My Chair (via La Shawn Barber):

So this evening Norm and I are watching Law and Order – Criminal Intent on NBC. At roughly 10 minutes before the end of the program during the pivotal moment of the episode when they are about to get the accused to confess, the drama is interrupted with “This is a special report from NBC news.” Living in a post-9/11 world these thoughts begin to race through my mind when a network show is interrupted with such an announcement:

1. Terrorists have attacked a major city in the United States.
2. The President or some other important leader of our nation has been assassinated.
3. A threat of terrorism, such as a dirty bomb, has been announced and will affect us immediately.
4. The space shuttle has crashed.
5. Some other such terrible tragedy that affects our country had occurred.

Instead, an NBC newsreader informs us that ABC news anchor Peter Jennings had died. Your heart stops pounding and you realize that the MSM (mainstream media) really believes the death of one of their own is so important that we must know it before the next commercial break or evening news report. Incredible!

Touché.

1212am. Just received the first Jennings-related exploitative press release e-mailed from the left-wing group, Action on Smoking and Health:

The death of ABC-TV news anchor Peter Jennings shows the tenacious nature of smoking, and its often terrible consequences to a man seemingly robust and with so much more to contribute, says Professor John Banzhaf, Executive Director of Action on Smoking and Health, a national antismoking organization.

“With all of his knowledge of the deadly and addictive nature of cigarettes, and virtually unlimited resources and access to the best medical help in both trying to quit smoking and then in treating the resulting lung cancer, Peter Jennings was helpless and became one of tobacco’s best known victims,” says Banzhaf.

Geez.

Morning update: Lots of tribute coverate at TV Newser.

Brit Hume on Fox&Friends: “It’s hard to believe he’s gone…Peter was an extraordinarily gifted broadcaster.”

Emily Zanotti, a young blogger who grew up watching Peter Jennings, writes, “Goodbye and goodnight.”

More: President Bush issues statement of condolence.

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