One Year Ago Today…

One year ago today, Peter Jennings announced his lung cancer diagnosis.

On The World Newser, Jon Banner writes: “It’s hard to believe one year ago today Peter gathered the senior staff in my office to tell us he had lung cancer. I remember like it was yesterday. It was an emotional meeting and after he told us there was silence in the room. Sometime later that morning I went to his office to speak to him privately. Before I could open my mouth he said to me ‘I won’t make you cry if you don’t make me cry – deal?’ It didn’t work.”

World News Tonight will mark the milestone tonight by updating its 2005 series, “Quit to Live: Fighting Lung Cancer.” The broadcast will check in with several people who are trying to quit smoking, and look at “how the death of Jennings (and later, Christopher Reeve’s widow Dana) affected cigarette sales, lung cancer research and related matters.”