Jean’s run for the record books

With the retirement of CTV’s Lloyd Robertson, KING’s Jean Enersen will now continue to run in a smaller field for the “honor” of being the longest-tenured TV news anchor in North America. Jean Enersen

I don’t keep these stats of course, but I got the idea to do a little research from a section in Wikipedia while doing a little reading about the drama happening at CTV right now involving Robertson’s replacement.

Robertson was the longest serving network anchor in TV history, but a few local talking heads have had even longer runs including Enersen, KTRK’s (Houston) Dave Ward and Chuck Scarborough at WNBC in New York.

Dave Ward started his anchor gig in 1965 – making this his 45th anniversary.

Enersen, the first female primary anchor in local TV, started anchoring in 1972 – putting her at number two as she passes her 38th year in the anchor chair.

Scarborough started in 1974 meaning he’s been on-the-job for 36 years.

Ward is 71, Enerson 66 and Scarborough 67.

What does this mean? It means that Enerson is about two years “behind” Ward, and about three years “ahead” of Scarborough when you correct for age.

I admit that I didn’t figure this down to the month – so this could be a little “off.”

I wonder if these three track each other? I wonder if they care who goes down in history as the longest lived anchor? Will they try to outlast each other? Will Ward work to maintain his lead? If not, can Enersen catch and surpass him thus setting a record the relatively older Scarborough will likely never catch? Will life expectancies and genetics decide this contest?

Who cares? I don’t know – it’s kind of interesting to watch though.