Acclaimed Health And Science Reporter Roger Field Remembered
by Adam Harrington, CBSNewYork.com
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- Roger Field, a print and broadcast journalist known for his quirky and engaging approach to health and science reporting, passed away last week.
Mr. Field, most recently of Upper Manhattan, died November 12, according to his daughter, Tiffany Field Fitzgerald. He was 74.
Mr. Field grew up in Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn, Fitzgerald said. His father, Herman Field, was known as an activist in the southern Brooklyn community and was credited with saving Kingsborough Community College, Fitzgerald said.
In his professional career, Roger Field became known in both New York and Chicago as an expert on medical and scientific inquiry. His résumé included freelance work for the New York Times and articles in Scientific American and Electronic Design magazines, Fitzgerald said.
Mr. Field also worked several stints in radio and appeared on 1010 WINS as a science specialist during the early 1970s. He also reported on health and science for NBC Radio in later years.
From the late 1970s until 1986, Mr. Field served as health and science editor for WBBM-TV, CBS2 Chicago – joining a celebrated and critically acclaimed local news team that included Chicago broadcast news icons Bill Kurtis and Walter Jacobson, and movie critic Gene Siskel, among others.
"What I try to do is tell people how the advances of civilization are going to affect their lives and tell it to them as clearly as I can," Mr. Field said in a 1979 promo for WBBM-TV.
On the air, Mr. Field's delivery involved live demonstrations and diagrams with moving parts to explain such intellectual topics as how gasohol works in an internal combustion engine.
"I think that he had a knack to find creative things in mundane things," Fitzgerald said. "I think that he always had a way to make something interesting out of something."
Mr. Field also hosted a series of family-oriented science specials at WBBM-TV and other CBS stations titled "Inside Out." In one "Inside Out" special on the science behind TV production, Mr. Field demonstrated ChromaKey technology by wearing a bright green garment as he stood in front of a ChromaKey screen – making it appear as though his head was floating high above the downtown Chicago skyline.
Mr. Field also served as a fill-in weatherman for WBBM-TV for a time, Fitzgerald said.
Mr. Field's flair for the unusual extended beyond his delivery on television, Fitzgerald said. Among those who knew him, he was also known for driving around town in a 1920s-era double-clutch Rolls Royce with the steering wheel on the passenger's side.
"It was his intention to sort of be our chauffeur after our wedding and he had meant to pick us up for the wedding in the Rolls Royce, but it was a two-seater," Fitzgerald said.
Fitzgerald said her father also had an "amazing ear," and could tell if a recorded tape was running a little slow just by listening for a pitch that was slightly off.
Mr. Field was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 1985, and his first response was to learn all about the disease from a scientific perspective, Fitzgerald said.
"At first, he approached it from a scientist's point of view and a researcher's point view, so he sort of dove in head first and learned all about it," she said.
In 1989, Mr. Field and his family returned to New York, living with his ailing father back in Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn. While first-rate doctors and medical intervention succeeded in slowing the progression of his own disease, Mr. Field's health declined as the years went on, according to Fitzgerald.
But even in recent years, Mr. Field was still able to enjoy some of his passions. He was also an accomplished musician – playing trombone, piano and bass fiddle – and he was still able to sit down at the piano and pound out a tune even as he struggled in other ways, Fitzgerald said.
"That gift didn't really leave him until pretty recently," she said.
Fitzgerald said her father inculcated a number of life lessons about curiosity and inquiry about the world.
"Even as a kid I remember him teaching me to look into things beyond the surface, because there was often something that was there that you might not immediately see," she said.
Fitzgerald added: "Something that stuck with me all the time was, 'Never trust a person who says, 'Trust me.' That obviously had an impact on me and I've repeated the same to my daughter."
In addition to Fitzgerald, Mr. Field is also survived by his wife, Alice; son-in-law, Neil Fitzgerald; and 9-year-old granddaughter, Sydney.
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