John Chancellor (July 14, 1927 - July 12, 1996) was an American journalist.

He first started his career in national news on the Huntley-Brinkley Report as a correspondent. In 1961, he replaced Dave Garroway as host of The Today Show, a role he filled for one year.

He is most known, however, as head anchor on the NBC Nightly News, a spot he held from 1970 to 1982. For most of his tenure on the show, he was the sole anchor, but later he also had help from fellow journalist David Brinkley. Although Chancellor was a well-recognized journalist in his own right, he was almost always dwarfed by Walter Cronkite, who was more popular. As a result, Cronkite's CBS Evening News always beat NBC in the ratings.

He retired from his head anchor duties in 1982 and was succeeded by Tom Brokaw. He continued to write and read editorial commentary for the program before moving to the northeast in 1993, where he died of stomach cancer in 1996.

External links

• Transcript, John Chancellor Oral History Interview, 4/25/69, by Dorothy Pierce McSweeny, Internet Copy, LBJ Library. Accessed April 3, 2005.