‘Today’ Show Former Host Jim Hartz Dies at 82

Martin Holmes April 25, 2022, 8:11 am

Jim Hartz Today — NBC/Everett Collection

Jim Hartz, the veteran TV personality and reporter who co-hosted the Today show with Barbara Walters in the mid-1970s, has died. He was 82.

According to Deadline, Hartz passed away on April 17 in Fairfax County, Virginia. His wife, Alexandra Dickson Hartz, confirmed the news, revealing that her husband had been suffering from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Born on February 3, 1940, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Hartz started his career as a reporter for KOTV in Tulsa in 1962 before being promoted to news director in 1964. At 24-years-old, he joined the NBC-owned WNBC-TV in New York, becoming the youngest correspondent that NBC had ever hired. There, he served as anchor of the 6 PM and 11 PM nightly newscasts.

In 1974, Hartz was promoted to the Today show, replacing Frank McGee, who died at 58. He would bring a low-key vibe to the show, which played off Walters’ more high-energy presenting style. During his two-year stint at Today, Hartz covered the end of the Vietnam War, President Nixon’s resignation, and the American Bicentennial.

However, when Walters left for ABC in 1976, producers of Today decided to replace Hartz with Tom Brokaw. Hartz would move on to WRC-TV in Washington, D.C., where he served as an anchor until 1979. After leaving NBC, Hartz began co-hosting the PBS series Over Easy, as well as other public TV programs, including Innovation, during the early 1980s.

In the early 1990s, Hartz co-anchored Asia Now for PBS, a joint venture with Japan’s NHK public broadcasting. That same decade, the Alexandria, Virginia native became chairman of the Will Rogers Memorial Commission and a member of the Oklahoma Journalism Hall of Fame.