Inside TV News

with Sara Lee Kessler in Conversation with Magee Hickey

Tues. April 22, 10:30-11:45 pm

Sara Lee currently reports for iHeartRadio and NBC News Radio. She was the former anchor for New York City's Channel 9 nightly local broadcast news program in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Previously a health reporter for New Jersey Network's nightly half-hour NJN News broadcast. She was hired by WWOR-TV in 1976 as a reporter and became co-anchor of News at Noon with Tom Dunn later that year. She also co-anchored the station's News 9 PrimeTime newscast 1983-1987. When WWOR-TV switched to a 10 PM newscast in late 1987, she became the solo anchor of News at Noon. Co-hosted 9 Broadcast Plaza 1989–1991 with future Today Show’s Matt Lauer; weekend news anchor and reporter for News at Ten. Among the first journalists to interview John Lennon when he received a green card after years of fighting U.S. government efforts to deport him. Sara won an Emmy Award for anchoring WWOR-TV's coverage of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. In 1994,she was fired by WWOR. She subsequently sued the television station for religious discrimination, among other charges. An Orthodox Jew, she claimed that she was forced to work on Saturdays, which is forbidden by her religion. She was later able to successfully sue the station for $7.3 million. Magee, a great friend of CL&L, has worked at every local TV station in NYC.