60 MINUTES, the most successful broadcast in television history, begins its 42nd season in September 2009. With 14.29 million viewers, it is the number-one news program and the 13th most-watched broadcast among all television programs, according to Nielsen. Offering hard-hitting investigative reports, interviews, feature segments and profiles of people in the news, the show that was created by Don Hewitt in 1968 is still a hit in 2010. Hewett received the third Taishoff award in 1985. Last year its audience grew by 10 percent, defying the industry trend. It has won more Emmy Awards than any other primetime broadcast, including a special Lifetime Achievement Emmy. It won back-to-back Peabody awards for excellence in television broadcasting in 2008 and 2009 to bring its total to 16. Other major awards include: four Emmys, three RTNDA Edward R. Murrow awards, the George Polk award, the Investigative Reporters and Editors award, an RFK Journalism Award, the Sigma Delta Chi award and two Gerald Loeb Awards for Distinguished Business and Financial Reporting. The correspondents and contributors of 60 MINUTES are Anderson Cooper, Katie Couric, Steve Kroft, Lara Logan, Scott Pelley, Byron Pitts, Charlie Rose, Morley Safer, Bob Simon and Lesley Stahl. Andy Rooney, the broadcast's commentator, began his regular on-air segment, "A Few Minutes with Andy Rooney" in 1978. Jeff Fager became the program’s current executive producer in 2004, continuing what NPF’s judges called “Hewitt’s great tradition.” Fager previously produced 60 MINUTES II, the CBS EVENING NEWS WITH DAN RATHER, and many other highly regarded shows. He has been personally honored by the Producers Guild of America, identified by TV Week as one of most powerful television news executives and received many of broadcast journalism’s highest awards.
2009 60 Minutes
60 Minutes / CBS