"The first call I had was from Tim to be on Meet the Press the next Sunday," Germond said. "And when my first book came out, the first call I had was to come on the program. My book went up to 26 on the Amazon list in about three hours."
Indicative of how hard Mr. Russert worked and how he sometimes seemed to be everywhere in the media, yesterday morning he appeared on Baltimore's WBAL radio station talking politics to promote Sunday's Meet the Press. Along with his expertise and enterprise, such city-by-city efforts played a key role in driving Meet the Press to the top in ratings.
Born Timothy John Russert Jr. in Buffalo on May 7, 1950, he graduated from Canisius High School and John Carroll University - both Jesuit intuitions. Later in life, Mr. Russert often credited the Jesuits with shaping and sharpening his intellect.
He went on to earn a law degree from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law and was a member of the bar in New York and Washington, D.C.
NBC anchorman Brian Williams cited that training in the law yesterday as a key to Mr. Russert's finely honed style of interviewing.
After graduating from law school, Mr. Russert went into New York state and national politics. He started in 1976 by working on the Senate campaign of Daniel Patrick Moynihan. In 1982, he served as an adviser to Mario Cuomo in his run for governor.
Mr. Russert joined NBC News as a vice president in 1984 and became host of Meet the Press in 1991. The show was then in third place among the three network Sunday morning programs in popularity. In recent years, driven by his aggressive questioning of guests and stellar critique of the political landscape, the show has become the most popular public affairs program on Sunday morning TV.
In addition to serving as host of Meet the Press and as NBC's Washington bureau chief, Mr. Russert also held the title of senior vice president for news at the time of his death.
Another sense of the place Mr. Russert held in American media life was the way in which the 24/7 cable channels kicked into overdrive on the news of his death, with national leaders and the cream of the Washington press corps lining up to celebrate Mr. Russert's life and career.
