HoB alumni: The career of Connie Chung

Connie Chung Yearbook Pic

Photo: Journalist Connie Chung graduated from Blair in 1964.

Journalist Connie Chung graduated from Blair in 1964. Photo courtesy of Connie Chung.

When former CBS news anchor Connie Chung graduated from Blair, in 1964, everything was different. For one, the school was located on Wayne Avenue (in the building that is now Silver Spring International Middle School). Though still large, the student body was much smaller than it is now, roughly 2000 students, and there were fewer opportunities for extracurriculars than now. But even more important than that: the school was in the midst of integrating and was almost a fully white institution. “I was one of the only Asians in my class,” Chung says. “Most of the school was white and middle class, and it was very cliquish.” 

Nonetheless, Blair gave Chung a pivotal experience that helped her appreciate the hardships faced by minorities at the time. Chung later became a role model for Asian Americans and women around the country. In 1993, she became the first woman to co-anchor an evening news program, and the first Asian to anchor any program on any national network. Over the course of her career, she has won three Emmy Awards and a Peabody Award for broadcast journalism. 

The Blair experience

When asked how her education at Blair might have prepared her for her career later on, Chung had little to say. “I never really caught on to anything [at Blair],” she says. “I was really just an ordinary, unfocused, boring kid, and being one of the only minorities at the school certainly didn’t help.”

Despite this, Chung does remember a few details of the good times she had at Blair. “I remember we used to have a Friday night dance every week, and that was the one time where we got to really interact with each other,” she says. Other than that, however, Chung says that there were little to no extracurricular activities she was interested in besides student government, leading her to struggle finding both friends and an interest. 

However, Chung did eventually find what interested her most, and strangely, it began with science. “Science was my strength,” she says. “That was the one thing I excelled at in school.” 

Apart from her experience with science, there was one pivotal moment outside of the classroom that truly shaped Chung’s path in life. 

Integration and race relations

This moment was perhaps the one thing she kept with her after high school. It happened within the larger context of the Civil Rights movement when Blair was still integrating. “I graduated in 1964 and one month later, after the Civil Rights Act was signed into law,” Chung says. “So during my time, Blair was still being integrated.” 

She says that this integration, even in a liberal area like Silver Spring, led to a very memorable conflict. In an excerpt from her book, Connie: A Memoir, which was not included in the final print, Chung retells the story of a Black student named Silas Craft who underwent a serious football injury during Chung’s sophomore year. “Right in the beginning of the year, Silas took a blow at football practice,” she writes. “A teammate’s full weight landed on his right leg and broke it below the knee. An ambulance rushed him to the nearest hospital.” 

However, due to the racial discrimination still present at that time, Craft didn’t receive proper treatment for his injury. “When the ambulance attendants wheeled Silas over to a nurse, she carelessly shoved his gurney into the ER, the door, hitting his broken leg,” Chung writes. “Silas’ two teammates who had accompanied him in the ambulance were horrified. They proceeded to stand guard on each side of Silas until his parents arrived. I asked Silas, ‘Was the nurse white?’ He replied, ‘Yes.’”

Eventually, Craft's injury became so infected that doctors had to amputate it, a decision they later regretted. “He developed gangrene, which should not have occurred,” she writes. “Ultimately, Silas’ right leg was amputated below the knee. Later, other doctors who had not been part of the original team, told Silas that he should not have lost his leg. That he was not given quality, proper care that would have prevented gangrene from setting in. There were many at Blair, both adults and students, who felt Silas experienced racial discrimination.” 

From this traumatic example of seeing a friend hurt so badly by discrimination, Chung found motivation in new legislation. As she writes in the unpublished excerpt of her memoir: “I told Silas I wanted to tell his story because of the 1964 Civil Rights Law which was passed in our senior year at Blair.”

Silas Craft’s experience had a large impact on Chung mentally, emotionally, and professionally, even pushing her to become a journalist. Still, the path would have been extremely difficult for Chung had there not been a movement to increase minority employees in journalism and media “Had there not been such a push to hire women and minorities, I would not have been hired for my first job and television news – and many subsequent jobs,” she writes. 

The next generation 

When she entered the University of Maryland majoring in biology, Chung soon found out the subject was not for her. So instead she looked for other options. “I had an internship with a congressman on Capitol Hill,” she says. “I wrote press releases for him, and that's when I became interested in journalism.” 

Soon, Chung was “exhilarated” by the press room and her entire focus shifted. Out of college, she worked for Washington’s WTTG-TV and got her first big break in 1971 when she was hired by CBS News. Chung says in the end it was all about finding her passion. “That’s what I would tell the younger generation: find something you're passionate about,” she says. “You’ll probably change your mind a thousand times over like I did, but that’s okay.” 

When asked about how to be as ferocious and persistent a reporter as she is, Chung responded quickly. “You have to dig deep and find stories no one else finds,” she says. “That’s what makes journalism such a fascinating profession. It’s all about searching for the truth.” 

Despite being retired from television news, Chung still maintains a fierce sense of curiosity. During the interview, she began to shoot questions back at me about my life and my story. I said to her: “You’re asking so many questions, it’s almost like this is your interview!” 

“Sorry,” she responded. “I guess I’m just used to it.”