The error

Harry F. Byrd Jr. is at the far right. The woman in the photo is his wife, Gretchen. On the far left is Harry F. Byrd Sr. The man in uniform is the junior Byrd's son, Thomas Byrd. (Courtesy of Special Collections, University of Virginia)

My career in broadcast journalism started to unravel fast at 6:15 p.m. on December 16, 1977. I was in the WTVR TV master control room for the first portion of "News/90." In the studio, Ken Srpan and Bob Beaudreaux were anchoring.

A young woman reporter, a recent hire, was assigned to stay in the newsroom to monitor the other TV station's newscasts, the AP wires and the police radios. She called me on the intercom to say that Virginia Senator Harry F. Byrd Jr. had been killed in an automobile crash on his way home from Washington, D.C. She said a spokesman for the senator had telephoned with the news from a hospital in Winchester.

My first thought was that this was truly a major news story that would have both political and emotional dimensions in Virginia. "Get what you can on paper fast and bring it me in the control room," I told her. Within 90 seconds, she was standing breathlessly beside me with a short bulletin in script form. The broadcast had just gone to a commercial, so I gave a copy to the director, and ran to the studio with copy for the two anchors just as the commercial break was ending.

I forget which of the anchors read the bulletin on the air, but I'll never forget the words. "Here is a bulletin just in to WTVR news. U.S. Senator Harry F. Byrd Jr. has been killed in an automobile accident, according to a spokesman for the senator speaking from a hospital in Winchester. The crash happened as Byrd was on his way home from Washington for the weekend. We'll have more details as soon as they become available."

The Byrd family name was legion in Virginia. Harry F. Byrd Jr. had been a U.S. senator since 1965. His father had held the seat before him. Harry F. Byrd, Sr. had been a commanding figure in Virginia politics for much of the first half of the 20th century. He was elected governor in 1925, then a U.S. senator in 1933, and led a still-dominant conservative faction that was known as the Byrd Machine. Harry F. Byrd Jr. was also a crony of the man who owned WTVR TV, Roy H. Park.

We repeated that first brief bulletin a few minutes later, just before the Walter Cronkite CBS news at 6:30. We promised more details in the 7 p.m. potion of "News/90."

I was already plotting coverage of the story. I started grabbing reporters and photographers as I headed down to the basement newsroom. I gathered the staff around my desk and began making assignments. The two anchors would work the phones to get more details for the 7 o'clock broadcast. I dispatched a crew to the Governor's Mansion for reaction. I sent another crew to Winchester and assigned a third team to contact state political leaders for reaction.

The reporter who was about to make the drive to Winchester asked me if Byrd's body was still at the hospital. I turned to the reporter who had taken the call and asked. She didn't know. "What's the call-back number for the senator's spokesman?" I asked. She told me she didn't have one.

That's when the bottom dropped out of my stomach. It was a basic tenet in journalism that you get a call-back number from somebody who telephones with major news. Then you call them back to verify that they were who they said they were. My new reporter, barely out of college, hadn't done that. Nobody, including me, had taught her that.

I ran for the AP teletypes to see if they had moved a story about Byrd. Nothing. I told the young reporter to telephone the Winchester hospital and see if she could verify the story. I told a production assistant to call the state police to verify the accident. The two anchors who were already working the phones were coming up empty. Every phone in the newsroom was now ringing as the AP, the local dailies and other TV stations were calling us to verify our story.

One of the anchors got through to Senator Byrd's press secretary at his home. He was appalled when he learned what we had reported. He knew for a fact that Senator Byrd was very much alive. The hospital in Winchester was also denying that Byrd had even been there that day, alive or dead.

I called all the crews back to the station and sat down at my desk to write what we knew. My first job was a two-sentence "crawl" to run at the bottom of the screen right then, while the Cronkite news was still on the air: "We are unable to confirm our report of the death of Senator Harry F. Byrd Jr.," it said. It ran at about 6:40 p.m., about 20 minutes after our first bulletin.

A few minutes later I ratcheted in another sheet of paper to write the lead story for the 7 p.m., newscast. "WTVR news and WTVR news director Don Dale apologize to you, our viewers, and to Senator Harry F. Byrd Jr., for our erroneous report during the 6 p.m. broadcast about the senator's death. A spokesman for the senator confirms that the senator is alive, and our report was wrong."

It would be the last story I would ever write for WTVR TV.

I watched the 7 p.m. newscast in numb silence in the newsroom. When it ended, I telephoned the station manager. He was not at home, but I left a message for him.

I knew then -- and now -- that the erroneous report on "News/90" was my fault. I had not asked the right questions of the young reporter who had taken the hoax call. I had acted too quickly during the heat of a live broadcast. As a journalist, I had made a bad mistake.

That was on a Friday night. On Saturday, the hoax was the lead story on the AP wire and in the newspapers. The furor continued on Monday morning, when I got an early call from the station manager's secretary asking me to report to his office right away.