last word
‘THE BIG STORY’ TONIGHT IS
Larry Kane
PHILADELPHIA’S ANCHORMAN
JARRAD SAFFREN | STAFF WRITER
to travel on the entire upcoming tour
instead. Kane was not sure if he should
go. He was a newsman, not a music guy.

But his mother, who died right before
the tour, told him to go.

“She said, ‘Th is is going to take you
into television,’” Kane remembered.

Kane’s reports were syndicated to
50 stations around the country. Th ey
also landed him an off er to come to
Philadelphia and work for WFIL Radio
and WFIL-TV.

H The Bay of Pigs
Living in Miami, Kane had friends
who immigrated to the United States
aft er the Fidel Castro-led Cuban
Revolution in the 1950s. One day, those
friends invited the newsman, who did
half-hour updates for a local radio sta-
tion called WAME, to a town south of
Miami. Th ey took him into a fi eld where kids
were shooting off “World War II weap-
ons,” Kane recalled. Th e kids told Kane
that they were going to invade Cuba
but swore him to secrecy. Th ey said the
40 Philadelphia
John F. Kennedy administration had
promised to provide air cover.

Kane told them to call him on his
phone at the station when the invasion
was underway. When the kids landed
on the beach and the Kennedy admin-
istration failed to provide that cover,
two of them called their friend at the
station. Th en he went on the air with
his usual news update.

“I got a call from Th e New York
Times. ‘What’s going on?’” Kane
recalled. “I was just lucky.”
Th ree years later, Kane got “lucky”
again. SEPTEMBER 22, 2022 | JEWISHEXPONENT.COM
The Beatles
Aft er their famous appearance on
“Th e Ed Sullivan Show” in 1964, Th e
Beatles arrived at Miami International
Airport. Kane followed them to Th e
Hotel Deauville in Miami Beach and
got to do “a little interview.”
Aft er that conversation, he got letters
from kids who wanted to meet the
famous group. He then wrote to Brian
Epstein, Th e Beatles’ manager, to see if
he could organize a station promotion
for kids to attend the band’s upcoming
Gator Bowl stop in Jacksonville.

Epstein wrote back and invited him
During his fi rst few years here, Kane
worked as a reporter, news director
and occasional weekend anchor. But in
1969, the lead anchor’s toupee fell off in
the bathroom before a broadcast, and
he handed Kane, who was in there with
him, the script.

Th e newsman nearly led to his own
report from City Hall during that
broadcast, but he got it done without
any major mistakes, and then got asked
to fi ll in again. When the station com-
menced an anchor search later that
year, Kane sat in on an interim basis.

His channel was a distant third in the
ratings. But as the search continued, the rat-
ings started to improve. With reps,
the new anchor’s pace got faster; his
eye contact got so good that he barely
needed the teleprompter; and his
laughter was natural.

On Valentine’s Day 1970, the general
manager and news director invited him
to dinner and off ered him the anchor
seat. From April 1970 to April 1971,
the station climbed to No. 1 in the rat-
ings. Th e newsman would remain in an
anchor seat until 2002.

“I’ve always liked news,” he said. “I
still like news.”
Kane left briefl y for a job with
WABC-TV in New York City in the late
1970s. But he was commuting, which
made him realize something.

“I wanted my kids to grow up here,”
he concluded. JE
jsaff ren@midatlanticmedia.com
Courtesy of Larry Kane
e’s the man who coined the
phrase “Th e Big Story” at the
top of Action News broad-
casts on 6abc.

He spent more than three decades
bringing Philadelphians the story from
his anchor chairs at all three local net-
work affi liates, ABC, CBS and NBC.

He even brought Americans the story
of the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in
1961 and of Th e Beatles’ culture-stop-
ping arrival in North America in the
1960s. But now, as he approaches the age of
80 in a couple of weeks, Larry Kane is
looking back on his own story.

Th e fi rst Jewish anchor in the
Philadelphia region still lives in
Abington and belongs to Old York
Road Temple-Beth Am, a synagogue he
joined in 1977. He also does freelance
work for KYW Newsradio.

But for the most part, Kane is a
grandpa now. When he spoke to the
Jewish Exponent on Sept. 14 about his
career, he was excited for the next day, a
Saturday, in which he would do his best
to attend the two soccer games and two
baseball games that his grandchildren
were playing in.

“I’d rather spend the time with them
than go down to Florida,” he said.

At the same time, Kane was willing
to go to Florida in his mind, because
that’s where his journey began.