Behind the Eye: My Life in Media is the lively story of how a little boy from Buffalo, enchanted with moving pictures, rose to become president and chairman of CBS Broadcasting during television’s Golden Age in the 1970s and 1980s. Ever the optimist, dealmaker, and creative mind, Gene Jankowski was largely responsible for CBS’s meteoric rise to the coveted position of number-one network—and for keeping it there. Jankowski tells the stories behind the headlines about such bold-faced names as Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather, William S. Paley, Martha Stewart, Ted Turner, Donald Trump, and other newsmakers. His tales touch on the “Mad Men” era of Madison Avenue advertising, the glamour and glitz of Hollywood, and the power and politics of Washington, D.C. Interwoven are events from Jankowski’s colorful personal life, and tales from the intersection of the two. If you’re nostalgic for a time when there were three major TV networks, competing fiercely every week to be the U.S.’s #1 source of news, entertainment, and sports, then Behind the Eye is the book for you.
“Rare is the leader who embodies the instinct and intellect to drive an art form forward—as Gene Jankowski did for television. And even rarer is the talent who can entertain with elegance—as he does in the pages of this extraordinary memoir.”
— Bob Gazzale, President and CEO, American Film Institute
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The Story
For much of the twentieth century, there were only three television networks—impossible to believe in today’s fragmented communications landscape. We, as an American audience, got our news from the same few sources, as well as our entertainment, sports, and advertising—and we watched them on the same day and time. As the president of the CBS Broadcast Group more than a decade, I was fortunate to meet, work with, and befriend many of the twentieth century’s leading politicians, movie and television stars, athletes, newscasters, and newsmakers. Over the years since, I have been encouraged by friends and other members of my family to write a memoir of my career. In a professional sense, one could argue that my time in broadcasting was an interregnum, as I worked with and for many of the pioneers in radio and television and was still active as new entrepreneurs entered the communications universe.
But the genesis of this book was more personal than professional. In 2001, on the occasion of our fortieth wedding anniversary, my wife Sally and I discussed ideas about how we should celebrate our fiftieth anniversary. One was to write a history of family events that had occurred during the decades of our lives. Sally and I began this project, and an excerpt of those early pages is included here.
To these ends, I’ve shared some of my thoughts and experiences from my life, risks and rewards both professional and personal. As I put the finishing touches on Behind the Eye, I celebrated my ninety-first birthday. I feel fortunate to share those stories with you.