CBS Reports

Origin

CBS Reports premiered on October 27, 1959, as a successor to Edward R. Murrow's See It Now, which had ended 15 months earlier. The program employed several members of the See It Now production staff. For the remainder of 1959 and through 1960, it aired irregularly as a series of specials. In January 1961, CBS gave it a regular Thursday 10 p.m. (EST) slot, where it faced The Untouchables on ABC and Sing Along With Mitch on NBC, leading many affiliates to pre-empt it with local programming. (EST), stating the earlier hour would allow more young people to watch, but it again competed with rating leaders The Virginian and Wagon Train. CBS Reports led the Wednesday lineup until Fall 1965, when it was moved to Tuesday at 10 p.m. opposite The Fugitive and NBC's Tuesday Night at the Movies.

Notable episodes

CBS Reports received a Peabody Award in 1960 for Harvest of Shame, which examined the lives of migrant workers. The 1961 episode Biography of a Bookie Joint, documenting an illegal Boston bookmaking establishment, was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Program of the Year; Boston Police Commissioner Leo J. Sullivan resigned after the episode showed department members visiting the establishment. The Homosexuals (1967) was the first national network broadcast on homosexuality; it was praised for debunking negative stereotypes but also condemned for generalizations and promoting other stereotypes, with LGBT activist Wayne Besen calling it the single most destructive hour of antigay propaganda in U.S. history.

Gay Power, Gay Politics (1980) was criticized for misrepresenting sexual issues and reinforcing stereotypes; CBS later apologized for manipulating the soundtrack of a speech by San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein, the first apology to the LGBT community from a major news organization. In 1982, General William Westmoreland sued CBS over The Uncounted Enemy, which contended he manipulated intelligence reports; Westmoreland dropped the lawsuit, but CBS lost its libel insurance.

Revivals

The CBS Reports banner was revived in 2009 with CBS Reports: Children of the Recession, a series of reports across all CBS News platforms led by Katie Couric; it won a Columbia School of Journalism Alfred DuPont Award. A second Couric-led series, CBS Reports: Where America Stands, aired in January 2010. In 2016, the CBSN streaming service launched CBSN Originals, a documentary series sponsored by Pfizer, with Adam Yamaguchi as executive producer and correspondent; Yamaguchi noted that streaming allows stories to be as short or long as needed. In 2022, CBSN Originals was rebranded as CBS Reports, with each documentary taking a deep dive into key issues such as culture wars, climate change, extremism, economic shifts, and technologies saving or threatening humanity.