Who

Legendary TV personality Mike Wallace was a correspondent for CBS's 60 Minutes from 1968 until his departure in 2006.

Backstory

Myron Wallace grew up in Brookline, Mass. and found his calling at the campus radio station while a student at the University of Michigan. Settling in Chicago after graduation, he worked as a news writer and broadcaster before leaving for World War II, serving as a Navy communications officer. After the war, Wallace returned to Chicago and bounced between the worlds of news and entertainment—he announced radio shows and hosted a few game shows, and also lent his image to advertisements, most notably for Parliament cigarettes. During the '50s he hosted a couple of talk shows (Night-Beat, Mike Wallace Interviews, Newsbeat) then moved back to hard news and headed off to cover Vietnam for CBS. In 1968, he was tapped by Don Hewitt to co-host a new CBS show called 60 Minutes. Although the show delivered relatively unimpressive ratings its first few years, it soon turned into one of the network's most successful programs. After four decades on the show, the baritone-voiced presenter retired in 2006, although he remains with CBS News as a "Correspondent Emeritus."

Of note

Wallace made a name for himself with his aggressive, bullying interviews; famous for his "gotcha" segments, he was one of the first to use hidden cameras to confront scam artists. Over the course of his career, his interviews generated plenty of controversy and the occasional lawsuit. General William Westmoreland waged a decade-long legal battle against Wallace and CBS over a report in the early '80s. And both CBS and Wallace were sharply criticized when an interview Wallace had conducted with Jeffrey Wigand—a former big tobacco executive—was killed in what was widely seen as a cave-in to corporate pressure. (The events became the basis for the movie The Insider.) But Wallace had plenty of moments of glory, too: He sat down with just about every major figure of the past half-century, including John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Yasser Arafat, Ronald Reagan, Deng Xiaoping, the Ayatollah Khomeini, Muammar Qaddafi, and Johnny Carson.

Medical file

Wallace has written that he suffers from depression, and in an interview following his retirement, he confessed that he'd once tried to kill himself. More recently, in 2003, Wallace slipped on a jetty and hit his head in Martha's Vineyard, which he says has caused him trouble with his memory.

Personal

The bronzed newsman has been married four times; he wed his current wife, Mary Yates, in 1986. Wallace's eldest child, Peter, was killed in a mountain climbing accident in Greece in 1962; following his disappearance, Wallace flew to Europe, retraced his son's steps, and helped locate his body. His younger son is Chris Wallace, who hosts Fox News Sunday. Wallace also has a daughter named Pauline and a stepson named Eames Yates. The Wallaces live at 730 Park Avenue and also have a home on Martha's Vineyard.

True story

In 2004 Wallace was arrested for disorderly conduct after "attacking" two New York Taxi and Limousine Commissioners who were interrogating his car service driver while Wallace was picking up take-out at Luke's Bar and Grill on Third Avenue. The charges were later dropped.