FRANKLY FRANGO

By John Frango

Myron Kandel is honored by journalism society for brilliant career

2-7-2000

Myron Kandel, a founder of award-winning Cable News Network and its financial editor and economic commentator, was honored recently with a Quarter Century News Achievement Award by The Society of The Silurians, Inc., an organization of veteran New York City journalists.

And no journalist ever deserved it more.

I met Kandel when he was with Armed Forces Press Services as its Washington correspondent in 1955, and I was with AFPS in New York.

My first "big" assignment when I became a young publicist for Pepsi-Cola in 1964 was to "place" a story about the appointment of the soft drink company's new CEO and Pepsi's purchase of Frito-Lay. I "hand-delivered" to the papers in those halcyon days--and that's no longer in vogue. When I arrived at the prestigious Herald Tribune--where Kandel was a highly respected financial editor--he greeted me warmly.

"Good story, Mike," I pitched confidently. He just smiled.

The next morning there's a four-column picture of Pepsi's CEO and the president of Frito-Lay plus a very "deep" story. I became an instant hero at Pepsi, because the Trib was the paper of record at the firm.

I called Kandel to thank him. He said simply: "It was a good story. It merited the space."

Kandel was regarded by those in and out of the business as the finest financial editor in the long, proud history of the Trib. And that's no small compliment. The talented gentleman was also once a valued member of the financial department of The New York Times and later he was Financial Editor of the Washington Star and the New York Post.

Kandel sent me a copy of his influential, widely-read book "How to Cash In on the Coming Stock Market Boom." It was hailed for "accurately forecasting the bull explosion of the 80s." The inside cover was inscribed: "To a fine writer from a good friend, Mike."

When Kandel was hired by CNN in 1980, he made it his business to make certain the new network's approach to business reporting would differ greatly from the prosaic financial outlook taken by the competition.

He told Silurian News (which characterized Kandel as a visionary journalist) that for far too long TV business reporting was "the wasteland of television news"--so he became instrumental in bringing financial news to the forefront of television.

And his vision has paid off handsomely.

Kandel believes strongly that financial reporting should be honest, independent, and balanced. "I was always aware that some little old lady somewhere might read us and actually act on what we wrote," Kandel told Silurian News.

One day Kandel asked me to accompany him to the offices of The New York Times where he introduced me to Max Frankel--who was to become the biggest of the biggies at the most prestigious and influential newspapers in the country. I knew instinctively that I was in the presence of two future heavyweights in journalism, men with commanding intellects and superb insights.

Myron "Mike" Kandel is not only a tremendously gifted journalist and commentator-but he's a tremendously gifted human being.

It's been a great honor to consider him a friend and a colleague.