Susan Zirinsky Is the First Female President of CBS News—But Getting There Wasn’t Easy

Almost no one is anything but thrilled that Susan Zirinsky, 66, has become the President of CBS News: the first female to head up a national network news division and a never-stopped-working “legend” in TV news, to quote the New York Times. When she walked into the CBS building on her first day in her new job, Monday, January 8, “she made an entrance,” said the L. A. Times, “worthy of a rock star,” with “loud cheers and applause [arising] from elated staff members as she stepped into the newsroom at the network’s studio… for the first time since her new appointment was announced” the day before.

Her new position, replacing David Rhodes, has been termed a “win-win.” Z, as all her colleagues have called her from the beginning of her career, was the inspiration for the feisty, principled Holly Hunter character in the 1987 movie Broadcast News. She’s been at CBS for four decades—evening, morning, White House, and, since 1996, executive producer of 48 Hours. She’s a super-pro who has more than earned her stripes. In a sad and little-noted time confluence, however, her leg-up in news was helped by another path-breaking female news veteran—Sylvia Chase—who died, at 80, just days before Zirinsky was appointed to her new position.