He is an Icon of the American airwaves, a face and a voice we have been welcoming into our homes for the past half-century. Through times of great upheaval and interludes of business as usual, we have tuned in to David Brinkley's programs on NBC and now on ABC - The Huntley-Brinkley Report, David Brinkley's Journal, This Week with David Brinkley - for his sense of fairness and his distinctive ability to cut through cant and pretension.

We know that when he delivers the news it will be cogent, trustworthy and stamped with his trademark sardonic wit. Since his arrival in Washington in 1943 we have heard our history unfold in his unmistakable North Carolina cadences, yet in an age of information overload he is deeply appreciated for being a professional talker who doesn't believe in talking too much.

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Rich in anecdote and humor, David Brinkley's is a classic American story that overlaps with some of the great events and great personages of our era. He shares priceless moments, public and private: playing poker with Harry Truman, riding the rails with Winston Churchill, being whisked off by helicopter to Camp David by Lyndon Johnson, receiving the Medal of Freedom from George Bush, walking the beach with D Day veterans.

And he takes aim at some chronic American bugbears - including taxes and political conventions - from his own, uniquely Brinkley, vantage point.