Alistair Cooke

Alistair Cooke
Born	Alfred Cooke (1908-11-20)November 20, 1908 Salford, Lancashire, England
Died	March 30, 2004(2004-03-30) (aged 95) New York City, U.S.
Nationality	British-American
Occupation(s)	journalist and broadcaster
Notable credit(s)	Letter from America Alistair Cooke's America
Spouse(s)	(1) Ruth Emerson, (2) Jane Hawkes White

Alistair Cooke should not be confused with Alastair Cook, English cricketer.

Alistair Cooke KBE (November 20, 1908 – March 30, 2004) was a British-American journalist and broadcaster.

Born in England, he became a naturalized American citizen, and lived in New York City with his family for most of his adult life.

Early life

Born in Salford, in Lancashire, England, to a Methodist father and an Irish mother, as Alfred Cooke, he legally added the name "Alistair" at age 22. He was educated at Blackpool Grammar School and was awarded a scholarship to study at Jesus College, Cambridge, where he gained an honours degree (2:1) in English. He was heavily involved in the arts of the college, becoming the editor of The Granta, the student magazine, and setting up the Mummers, the first co-sex theatre group, from which he notably rejected a young James Mason, telling him to stick to architecture.

While still in England, Cooke became engaged to Henrietta Riddle, the daughter of actor Henry Ainley and the novelist Bettina Riddle, also known as the Baroness von Hutten; but as a graduate student, he went to Yale University and Harvard University in the United States for two years on a Commonwealth fund fellowship, and his fiancée was to desert him while he was away on this trip, in January 1933. However at the end of this year he met Ruth Emerson, who was the great-niece of Ralph Waldo Emerson. They were married the next year. Originally Charlie Chaplin, whom Cooke had befriended in Hollywood, was supposed to be his best man, but the mercurial actor vanished at the last minute. Having divorced Ruth (by whom he had a son, John) in 1944, he married Jane Hawkes White, a portrait painter and daughter of a New Jersey senator, thereby acquiring two stepchildren (Holly and Stephen) and subsequently a new daughter (Susie).

Media beginnings

In 1934, at the end of his study fellowship, Cooke saw a newspaper headline that Baldwin, the prime minister's son, had been fired by the BBC as film critic. Cooke sent a telegraph to the so-called "Director of Talks" asking if he could be considered for the post. He was invited for interview and took the Cunard back to England, arriving four hours late for his interview. He suggested typing out a critique on the spot, and a few minutes later, he was offered the job. In October 1934, Cooke became a film critic for the BBC. He was also London correspondent for NBC. Each week, he recorded a 15-minute talk for American listeners on life in Britain, under the series title of London Letter. He also sat on a committee for the BBC headed by George Bernard Shaw on correct pronunciation. The fact that Shaw spoke with a strong Dublin accent caused him some amusement.

In 1936 Cooke intensively reported on the Edward VIII abdication crisis for NBC. He made several talks on the topic each day to listeners in several parts of the United States. He calculated that in ten days he spoke 400,000 words on the subject. During the crisis he was aided by a twenty year old Rhodes Scholar, Walt Rostow, who would become Lyndon B. Johnson's national security advisor.

Move to United States

Cooke began what was to become a permanent emigration in 1937, although his claim for citizenship took over four years to be processed. He swore the Oath of Allegiance on 1 December, 1941, six days before Pearl Harbor was attacked. Shortly after emigrating, Cooke suggested to the BBC the idea of doing the London Letter in reverse: a 15-minute talk for British listeners on life in America. A prototype, Mainly About Manhattan, was broadcast intermittently from 1938, but the idea was shelved with the outbreak of World War II in 1939. During the war, he broadcast a weekly American Commentary on the BBC concerning the war.

During this time, as well, Cooke undertook a journey through the whole United States, recording the lifestyle of ordinary Americans during the war – and their reactions to it. The manuscript did not arouse much interest after the war, but it was discovered a few weeks before his death in 2004 and published as The American Home Front: 1941-1942 in the United States (and as Alistair Cooke's American Journey: Life on the Home Front in the Second World War in the UK) in 2006. Accompanied by strong reviews, it stands as the only incisive first-hand journal of the American homefront ever published, even if the account is confined to the early stages of the war.

The first American Letter was broadcast on March 24, 1946 (Cooke said this was at the request of Lindsey Wellington, BBC's New York Controller); the series was initially confirmed for only 13 installments. The series finally came to an end 58 years (2,869 installments) later, in March 2004. Along the way, it picked up a new name (changing from American Letter to Letter From America in 1950) and an enormous audience, being broadcast not only in Britain and in many other Commonwealth countries, but throughout the world by the BBC World Service.

In 1991, Alistair Cooke received a special BAFTA silver award for his contribution to Anglo-American relations.

The Staff Reporter

In 1947, Cooke became a foreign correspondent for the Manchester Guardian, for which he wrote until 1972. (It was, incidentally, the first time he had been employed as a staff reporter; all his previous work had been freelance.) He has also served as foreign correspondent for The Times.

Omnibus

In 1952, Cooke became the host of CBS's Omnibus, the first commercial network television series devoted to the arts. It featured appearances by such personalities as Hume Cronyn, Jessica Tandy, Gene Kelly, and Leonard Bernstein. The series marked Bernstein's first-ever television appearances.

Mid to Later Years

In 1968, he was yards away from Robert F. Kennedy when he was assassinated, and was a witness to the events that followed.

For more than 50 years Alistair Cooke lived in a rent controlled apartment in Manhattan, easily outliving several property owners and all fellow tenants.

In 1971, Cooke became the host of the new Masterpiece Theatre, PBS's showcase of quality British television. He remained host for another 22 years, retiring from the role in 1992. He achieved his greatest popularity in this role, and was the subject of many parodies, including "Alistair Cookie" in Sesame Street's "Monsterpiece Theater" and, arguably, Leonard Pinth-Garnell in Saturday Night Live's "Bad Conceptual Theater".

In 1973 Alistair Cooke was awarded an honorary knighthood (KBE). However, he could not be called "Sir Alistair" since he had lost his British nationality during World War II.

Alistair Cooke's America, a 13-part television series about the United States and its history, was first broadcast in both Britain and the US in 1973, and was followed by a book of the same title. It was a great success in both countries, and resulted in Cooke being invited to address the joint Houses of the United States Congress as part of Congress's bicentennial celebrations. Following the series' broadcast in the Republic of Ireland, Cooke won a Jacob's Award, one of the few occasions when this award was made to the maker of an imported programme.

Alistair Cooke said that, of all his work, Alistair Cooke's America was that of which he was most proud; it is the result and expression of his long love of America. (Cooke was once asked how long it took him to make the series. "I do not want to be coy," he replied, "but it took 40 years.")

Later Life and Death

On March 2, 2004, at the age of 95, following advice from his doctors, Cooke announced his retirement from Letter from America — after 58 years, the longest-running speech radio show in the world.

Cooke died at midnight on March 30, 2004 at his home in New York City. He had been ill with heart disease but died of lung cancer which had spread to his bones.

On December 22, 2005, the New York Daily News reported that bones of Cooke and many other people had been surgically removed before cremation by bodysnatchers working for a tissue-recovery firm. The thieves allegedly sold the body parts for use in (among other things) dental and bone implants. The cancer that Cooke was suffering from prior to his death had spread to his bones, making them unsuitable for transplant and implant therapies. Reports indicated that the people involved in selling the body parts altered his death certificate to hide the cause of death and reduce his age from 95 to 85. Michael Mastromarino and Lee Cruceta agreed to a deal that resulted in their imprisonment. Michael Mastromarino was sentenced on June 27, 2008 in the Supreme Court in Brooklyn to between 18-54 years in jail. [1].

The Fulbright Alistair Cooke Award in Journalism

After Alistair Cooke's death the Fulbright Alistair Cooke Award in Journalism was established as a tribute to the man and his life and career achievements. The award supports students from the United Kingdom to undertake studies in the US and for Americans to study in the UK. It is offered for a Masters in Journalism or specialist study (e.g. Middle Eastern Studies) leading to a career in journalism.

The Fulbright Programme (www.fulbright.co.uk), sponsored by the US Department of State Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, was created in the aftermath of World War II though the efforts of US Senator J. William Fulbright.

UK recipients of the Fulbright Alistair Cooke Award are listed below.

2008-9 Simon Akam (Oxford University) and Dan Walker Smith (Edinburgh University)

2007-8 Peter Cardwell (Oxford University)

2006-7 Archie Bland (Cambridge University)

2005-6 Ewan Jones (Cambridge University)

Bibliography

• Douglas Fairbanks: The Making of a Screen Character (1940)
• Mencken (1955)
• A William March Omnibus : with an introduction by Alistair Cooke (1956)
• A Generation on Trial: The USA v. Alger Hiss (1982) ISBN 0-313-23373-X
• The Patient Has the Floor (1986) ISBN 1-55504-214-7
• Six Men (1995) ISBN 1-55970-317-2
• Fun & Games with Alistair Cooke: On Sport and Other Amusements (1996) ISBN 1-55970-327-X
• Memories of the Great and the Good (2000) ISBN 1-55970-545-0
• The American Home Front: 1941-1942 (2006) ISBN 0-87113-939-1
• Alistair Cooke's American Journey: Life on the Home Front in the Second World War (2006) ISBN 0-7139-9879-2

"America" books

• Talk about America
• Letter from America: The Early Years 1946-1968
• America Observed: From the 1940s to the 1980s/Ronald A. Wells
• Letters from America: The Americans, Letters from America and Talk About America
• One Man's America
• The Americans
• Alistair Cooke's America (2002)
• Letter from America: (1946-2004) (2004) ISBN 1-4000-4402-2
• The Marvellous Mania: Alistair Cooke on Golf (2007) ISBN 978-071399996-9

Cooke also co-authored several "coffee table" photo books.

Media

Alistair Cooke's America, a 13-part series on DVD, with a bonus where Cooke talks about his life.

External links

• Alistair Cooke at IMDb
• Letter From America - official BBC home page
• An interview with Alistair Cooke
• What makes him tick by the BBC's Nick Clarke, author of a biography of Alistair Cooke.
• Guardian 2004 highlights
• BBC News report of Cooke's death
• BBC Obituary
• Daily Telegraph obituary
• Guardian obituary
• Economist obituary
• Tony Blair gives tribute
• Alistair Cooke from the Open Directory Project
• Find-A-Grave profile for Alistair Cooke
• Daily News bone theft story
• Washington Post "In New York, a Grisly Traffic in Body Parts"