In celebration of a journalistic icon and in honor of his lasting contributions to the city he loved, NBC 4 New York hosted a special memorial service for Gabe Pressman on Tuesday.
Pressman, a New York icon and pioneering reporter whose local broadcast career spanned more than six decades, died Friday at the age of 93.
A Who's Who of New York public life past and present remembered Pressman, from Cardinal Timothy Dolan (who read from the Book of Psalms) and former Rep. Charlie Rangel, to NBC legend Tom Brokaw and former police commissioners Ray Kelly and Bill Bratton.
"For me, Gabe was the foundation of what reporting is about," said Brokaw, who anchored the NBC Nightly News for more than two decades.
The two-hour ceremony also featured heartfelt remembrances by his wife Vera, sons Mark and Michael and daughter Liz.
Liz Pressman, a news librarian at the New York Post and the only one of his children to follow their father into the news business, recalled their shared love of news as the thing that united them, even in the toughest of times.
"What's the wood?" her father would call her and ask, she said. (The front page of New York tabloids is often called "the wood" in the business.)
Credited with being the first television reporter in New York, Pressman called NBC 4 New York home for more than half a century. He is survived by his wife, four children, eight grandchildren and his great grandson.
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