Walter Cronkite’s contributions to news reports and American journalism have been so manifold that Arizona State University named their School of Journalism and Mass Communication after him. Cronkite certainly deserved it: throughout the second half of the 20th century, Cronkite went in front of the cameras at CBS to distill the major news and events of the day — sometimes routine, and sometimes, as with the assassination of John F. Kennedy and the landing of the first man on the moon, iconic historical events.

On this day, August 31, in 1963, Walter Cronkite appeared as the host of CBS Evening News, network’s first half hour daily news program. Cronkite, in his classic stoic pose, reported the day’s news behind a desk surrounded by fellow reporters busily at work writing and researching.

Cronkite was an obvious choice to head the news desk, earning his reporting chops on a previous news program that focused on noteworthy historical events of years past. Cronkite and his team of reporters on You Are Here, directed by young film director Sidney Lumet, reported on the Trial of Galileo, the death of Julius Caesar, or Salem Witch Trials, “interviewing” the main actors. Cronkite closed each show with his signature line: “What kind of a day was it? A day like all days, filled with those events that alter and illuminate our times. And you were there.”