CBS' "Early Show" made some news on Friday when it was reported that Marysol Castro would no longer do the weather on the morning show.
It was just the latest in a string of downbeat headlines about the third-place show, which seems to struggle no matter how many changes it makes (and even as its ratings inch upward and it wins plaudits for its hard-news edge).
But "The Early Show" is also part of a long tradition of morning show turmoil at CBS News. In fact, compared with some of the network's many attempts over the last 60 years to successfully come up with a rival to the "Today" show, "Early" is just about the most successful and stable CBS morning show ever.
We here at HuffPost Media consider ourselves to be students of history, so we're honored to bring you the first in a (very) occasional series, "A Look Back." Today, we examine one of the more ill-fated pairings on the Tiffany network: Sally Quinn and Hughes Rudd on the "CBS Morning News."
When Quinn and Rudd were paired up in 1973, it was at the least the fourth major push by CBS to craft a morning show that worked. The pair were dubbed "the beauty and the grouch." Rudd was CBS' Moscow correspondent, and Quinn was a former Washington Post reporter. The pairing lasted just six months, when Quinn fled back to the friendlier confines of the Post. The "CBS Morning News" lasted until 1979, when it was rebranded to "Morning," before being brought back in 1982, when it lasted until 1987, when it was replaced by "CBS This Morning," which lasted until 1999, when it was replaced by "The Early Show."
Below, see the opening minutes of the first show, in August of 1973. (CBS also has the full first hour of the show on its website.) Media buffs will notice a whole cast of familiar faces, from Quinn herself to the startlingly young Lesley Stahl, Dan Rather and Pat Buchanan. To put it bluntly, nobody seems quite at ease. For any CBS News staffers out there despairing of their lot, just watch this video and remember: it could have been worse.