Don Hollenbeck

Don Hollenbeck (March 30, 1905 – June 22, 1954) was a CBS newscaster, commentator, and associate of Edward R. Murrow and Fred W. Friendly. He was the writer and producer of CBS Views the Press, a Peabody Award-winning radio show that critiqued powerful print journalists. Hollenbeck was also a frequent critic of McCarthyism and was subject to a smear campaign for his supposed Communist leanings. He died by suicide in 1954 after a tumultuous personal and professional life.

Career Donald Hollenbeck was born and raised in Lincoln, Nebraska. In 1926, he left the University of Nebraska to take a job as a reporter at the Nebraska State Journal. Three years later, he moved to the Omaha Daily Bee. In 1937, he moved to New York and took the job of picture editor for the Associated Press. In 1940, when the newspaper PM was founded, he joined as picture editor and then became its national news editor. In 1941, he joined the United States Office of War Information. He was assigned to the foreign staff of NBC in London in March 1943. From there he went to Algiers just in time to take a place with the British troops landing at Salerno, Italy in September. He went in with the second wave—the assault wave which took the full force of German shells, and later made a number of battle-action recordings which were broadcast to the United States. before joining CBS in 1946. The move to CBS followed his firing by ABC's New York flagship radio station WJZ; after listening repeatedly over a six-month period to a musical commercial for Marlin razors that immediately preceded his 7 a.m. newscast, Hollenbeck told his listeners: "The atrocity you have just heard is no part of this show."

Murrow had Hollenbeck work on the innovative media-review program, CBS Views the Press, over the radio network's flagship station, WCBS. Hollenbeck discussed Edward U. Condon, Alger Hiss, and Paul Robeson. Regarding Condon, Hollenbeck critiqued anti-communists for going about their business the wrong way: Communists want nothing more than to be lumped with freedom-loving non-Communists ... This simply makes it easier for them to conceal their true nature, and to allege that the term 'Communist' is meaningless ... At the same time, we cannot let abuses deter us from the legitimate exposing of real Communists.

The first newsman WCBS-TV viewers saw after Murrow's March 9, 1954, documentary on Joe McCarthy was Hollenbeck, who told the viewers he wanted "to associate myself with what Ed Murrow has just said, and say I have never been prouder of CBS." That prompted O'Brian in the Hearst newspapers (including the flagship Journal-American) to step up his criticism of CBS and especially of Hollenbeck, who, despite his news experience under pressure situations, was a sensitive man.

Personal life and death

Hollenbeck was married three times. First to Jessie Seacrest (1926-1928, one child). Second to Mildred Raleigh (1934-1940). Lastly to Angelique 'Anne' Murphy Dean (1941-1952, one child). He was buried at Wyuka Cemetery in Lincoln. In his 2008 biography, CBS's Don Hollenbeck: An Honest Reporter in the Age of McCarthyism, journalist Loren Ghiglione suggests that other reasons for his suicide may have included depression, and the frequent published attacks by Jack O'Brian. The play began previews at the Winter Garden Theatre on March 12, 2025, opened on April 3 and closed on June 8. Actor Clark Gregg played Don Hollenbeck in the Broadway adaptation of Good Night, and Good Luck.