Editor 's note : CNN Contributor Bob Greene is a bestselling author whose new book is `` Late Edition : A Love Story . '' Bob Greene says television 's first anchorman took his replacement by Walter Cronkite with grace . ( CNN ) -- If you are a person whose life has been a series of constant triumphs , accompanied by the sound of unending cheers -- a life like that of , say , Walter Cronkite -- then this story is not for you . But if your life has had its share of disappointments and setbacks , you may be interested in the tale of a man by the name of Douglas Edwards . For some of you , the name may be vaguely familiar . For most of you , it probably means nothing . Douglas Edwards was the anchorman of CBS ' evening news broadcasts for 14 years . He was , in fact , network television 's first anchorman ; his broadcast -- `` Douglas Edwards with the News , '' it was called -- first aired at the dinner hour on CBS in 1948 , and continued until 1962 , when Edwards was told he was being replaced by Cronkite . For those 14 years , during the so-called Golden Age of Television , Edwards ' face was the face of CBS News . And CBS was the most prestigious of the three national networks . So what happened to him ? Chet Huntley and David Brinkley happened to him . NBC 's `` Huntley-Brinkley Report '' became wildly popular with the public ; it was clobbering Edwards in the ratings . CBS decided that it had to make a move . Such decisions are common in television , and in the wider world of business . What is uncommon -- what is a valuable lesson in grace and dignity -- is how Doug Edwards dealt with his demotion . I sought him out in the early 1980s . More than 18 years had passed since he had been pushed aside . He was still an employee of CBS . His job was to deliver a one-minute television `` newsbreak '' each mid-morning . He also was assigned to three brief radio reports a day . He was as polite a man as I have ever met ; we ended up keeping in touch over the years ( he died at age 73 in 1990 ) . Whatever bitterness he may have felt about losing the job he cherished , whatever anger he may have harbored toward the people who took it away from him , he chose to keep to himself . He had the same middle-of-the-country upbringing that Cronkite did ; Edwards was born in Ada , Oklahoma , and moved as a teenager with his family to Alabama . His journalistic credentials were impeccable ; he worked with Edward R. Murrow on CBS Radio 's storied London staff toward the end of World War II , and his interview subjects included Winston Churchill and John F. Kennedy . His on-scene reporting of the sinking of the Italian liner Andrea Doria in 1956 received widespread praise , and he was the recipient of a George Foster Peabody Award for his television work . He told me that after his demotion , he and Cronkite continued to run into each other in the hallways of CBS . Cronkite had become an American institution . Edwards told me there was no awkwardness , that the two of them liked and respected each other . Cronkite , in his autobiography , confirmed this . He wrote that on a Friday in 1962 , a CBS executive told him that he would be taking over the anchor chair on Monday . Edwards ' fall was just that abrupt . Cronkite wrote : . `` I was advised that Doug had just been told . I went straight to his office to try to assure him that I had not lobbied for his job and that the change had surprised me as much as I assumed it had surprised him . He must have been in shock , but he greeted me without the slightest touch of rancor . We had a short chat and parted with a sincere handshake . In this as in all things , Doug showed class . He was a true gentleman . '' Cronkite 's rise became the stuff of legend . And there was Doug Edwards , doing those daytime newsbreaks in the same building . He told me once that he had not given up on getting a bigger job again at the network : `` My attitude is , 'Let 's play for time here . ' I 've seen things change . '' But they did n't . When Ted Turner launched CNN , Edwards considered asking for work there . When ABC began its `` Nightline '' program , Edwards held out hope that CBS would try to match it late at night . `` I can do more nighttime television any time they 'd like me to , '' he told me . `` I think I do a pretty fair job on the anchor desk . There just are n't that many jobs . '' He paused , then said : `` Well , maybe I 'm living in a fool 's paradise . The tendency is to give something like that to younger men . But I 'm ready . If the chance came , my wife and I could move back from Connecticut and take an apartment in the city . '' It had to have hurt , watching Cronkite , and then Dan Rather , sit , year after year , in the chair that had been his ; it had to have made him ache over what might have been . But on his retirement day in 1988 , delivering his last daytime newsbreak , Edwards read a few headlines , then paused for the airing of a Doan 's Pills commercial . When the live camera came back to him , he could have said anything . This is what Douglas Edwards said : . `` A deep bow of gratitude , love and respect to the men and women of CBS News and to the company for which they stand . To you out there , thank you for honoring me with your presence in our audience , and most of all for your voices -- your most sweet voices . '' The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Bob Greene .
Bob Greene : Douglas Edwards was network television 's first anchorman . He says Edwards was replaced by Walter Cronkite to boost ratings . He says Edwards stayed at CBS News in a much reduced role . Greene : It must have hurt , but Edwards took it with grace and dedication .