First woman to anchor an evening network newscast

In 1964, shortly after joining ABC News, Marlene Sanders made broadcast history when she stepped in on an evening newscast to substitute for regular anchor Ron Cochran, who had fallen ill. On that broadcast, dated here as January 1, 1964 for year-level precision, she became the first woman to anchor an evening news program for a major U.S. television network.

At the time, network news was overwhelmingly male; women were largely confined to "women’s pages" in print or to light features on television. Sanders’ appearance in the anchor chair during a serious national newscast shattered a powerful symbolic barrier. Viewers saw a woman delivering the day’s events with authority, competence, and calm—demonstrating that gender need not determine credibility in hard news.

This breakthrough did not instantly transform hiring practices, but it opened conceptual space for later anchors such as Barbara Walters, Jessica Savitch, and Connie Chung. Internally, it signaled to ABC and competing networks that women could be trusted with the face of the broadcast and the responsibility of leading live coverage.

Sanders’ first anchoring of an evening network newscast is therefore a landmark in U.S. media history. It challenged entrenched newsroom assumptions, expanded the range of roles available to women journalists, and helped lay the groundwork for the gradual normalization of women in high‑profile anchor positions across broadcast and cable news.