Former ‘CBS Sunday Morning’ anchor Charles Osgood dead at 91

Former “CBS News Sunday Morning” anchor Charles Osgood died Jan. 23, 2024.

Osgood, who was 91, was living with dementia and his family said that was the cause of death.

Osgood began anchoring “Sunday Morning,” the network’s artsy and folksy newsmagazine in 1994.

He signed off from the show in 2016. Prior to his tenure, another Charles, Charles Kuralt, anchored the show since its launch in 1979. Kuralt died in 1997.

“For years now people — even friends and family — have been asking me why I keep doing this considering my age,” he said at the time. “It’s just that it’s been such a joy doing it! Who wouldn’t want to be the one who gets to introduce these terrific storytellers and the producers and writers and others who put this wonderful show together.”

In addition to his journalism experience, Osgood was also a poet and musician — and would play the piano on select broadcasts (he would also make appearances with The New York Pops, Boston Pops and The Mormon Tabernacle Choir). Those interests fueled many of the stories covered on the show — and continue to influence it to this day.

Prior to “Sunday Morning,” Osgood had been a regular at CBS News, including working on almost every broadcast at the network.

He also hosted “The Osgood File,” radio commentaries on the news of the day. Sometimes he used his poetry skills to present the segments in rhyme. 

Advertisement

His writing skills were legendary at CBS and he often followed the mantra of “short words, short sentences, short paragraphs. There’s nothing that can’t be improved by making it shorter and better.”

Osgood is survived by his wife of 50 years and five children.

“Charlie absolutely loved being part of the ‘Sunday Morning’ community. We’ll miss him terribly, but there is comfort in knowing his life was charmed, in large part thanks to you. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you for welcoming him into your homes on Sundays to share stories, and to highlight the better parts of humanity. He’ll see you on the radio,” his family said in a statement.

“CBS Sunday Morning” continues to air each week, now with host Jane Pauley at the helm. She took over from Osgood in 2016.

Back in 2017, the show’s iconic set was redesigned (on a related note, the designer of the original set died in 2022).

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the show switched to remote production, first using a room in Pauley’s home. It would eventually start chroma-keying stills of the set behind her but did resume using a scaled-back version of the 2017 set.

In May 2023, the show introduced a new open that retained its iconic fanfare theme but updated the on-screen visuals.

“Sunday Morning” also prompted CBS to rebrand “CBS This Morning” as simply “CBS Mornings” and switch over to using the Sunday show’s sun-inspired motif and a similar fanfare signature.

Reports at the time indicated that “Sunday Morning” staffers were irate at the decision to borrow elements from their program as a way to attempt to boost ratings on weekday mornings.

During the Kuralt era, CBS tried to replicate the Sunday format to five days a week as well.