sleep from 6 A.M. to about 2 P.M., and then get up and try to book guests
for that afternoon. At the time, nobody knew who Larry was. Guests had
to pay their own cab fare, find their way into this confusing building in
Crystal City [Washington, D.C., area], and there was a complicated eleva-
tor security system. We were losing guests all the time--it was a night-
mare." After a time, Ringe asked for an additional $15 a week and quit
when she was refused. "I was making so little money at the Larry King
Show that I had to sell my car to pay my rent one month. Yet, we were
taking the show on the road 12 weeks a year, staying in great hotels,
riding in limousines. I'd come home and have no food in my refrigerator.
My parents and everyone else thought I was nuts for killing myself for
this job, but I loved it. It was in my blood by then."
While working on the King program, Ringe would sometimes pitch
ideas to the Tomorrow Show. "I was a big fan of Tom Snyder. I just
called up one day and said, `Look, we've had these guests on and I
think you should have them on.'" She continued to call and became
friendly with one of the producers, who got her an interview with the
executive producer when she quit King's show. Hired to work for
five weeks on a temporary
basis, "I sold everything I
had and moved to New York."
At the end of the five weeks
she was invited to stay on.
There she worked with Robert
Morton, who later went on
to produce Late Show with
David Letterman.
By the time Snyder's show
was cancelled two and a half
years later, Ringe was being
represented by agent Alfred
Geller, who sent her on an
interview with an upstart cable
channel in Atlanta: CNN.
Unimpressed by the fledgling
operation, she happened to
pick up a trade magazine while
waiting for her interview and
discovered that CBS was
launching a new program. She
immediately phoned from the
lobby of CNN to set up an interview for when she returned to New York.
Hired on as an associate producer for CBS Morning News, Ringe was
What do you like
least about your job?
"The negative side of
things is that the job
gives you a knowledge
of the world that is miles
wide and sometimes only
an inch deep. You never become a real expert
at anything unless you specialize as a
reporter."--Jeanne Ringe
What do you love most
about your job?
"If you are a curious person, journalism is
the most wonderful career to have because
it allows you to explore every aspect of life:
the good, the bad, and the ugly; the extremes
of wonder and grandeur to the depths of
depravity and everything in between."
--Jeanne Ringe
VOICES OF
EXPERIENCE
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