Morley Safer remembered at NYC memorial service
NEW YORK -- CBS News, friends, and family celebrated the life of Morley Safer on Thursday.
The gathering in Manhattan attempted to reprise the life’s work of the man who holds the record for the longest run in prime time. In 45 years at “60 Minutes,” Safer wrote more than 900 stories with style, grace and honesty.
In 1987, he took us to a retirement home for opera singers. “Each person I spoke to here said they love this place, but each one wondered what all those untalented others were doing here,” Safer reported.
He was most proud of his investigation of the conviction of Lenell Geter, a Texas man wrongly imprisoned for armed robbery. In an interview, Geter told Safer “I consider myself a hostage in the house of injustice.”
“The more we started to check it out, the more this story and conviction just smelled to high heaven,” Safer said of the investigation.
Eyewitnesses agreed with him.
“When ‘60 Minutes’ ran their segment, I was out within about seven days,” Geter said years later. “I wouldn’t have a family had he not taken the time to come down there and take a snapshot of my experience, which was a travesty of justice. He saved my life.”
Morley’s life ended in May, but he lives by example in all we do.