journalists – Texas History Notebook

Peter Aloysius Molyneaux

Peter Molyneaux was born in New Orleans, Louisiana on April 18, 1882 to James Molyneaux and Rosana Lawler Molyneaux and was the oldest child of the couple. There is not a lot of biographical information available regarding his parents but his father James was listed as a day laborer in the 1900 census. Peter was one of two sons and five daughters in the family.

Peter is not known to have had a great deal of formal education early on, but began to work in the newspaper business while he was still in his upper teens. By 1898, he was working for the New Orleans Daily News and soon became a reporter for that publication. Molyneaux later worked for other local publications including the New Orleans Item and Daily States.

Bill Moyers

Billy Don “Bill” Moyers was a journalist who served in the John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson administrations. He was well known in media for his political observations. Moyers was born June 5, 1934 in Hugo, Choctaw County, in southeastern Oklahoma to John Henry Moyers and Ruby Jewell Johnson Moyers. The couple had two sons, Jim and Bill. By the time the 1940 census was recorded, the family had moved to Marshall, Texas. Both Jim and Bill graduated from high school in Marshall. Jim earned a B. A. degree from University of North Texas (then known as North Texas State College). Bill attended North Texas for two years before transferring to University of Texas at Austin.

Caro Crawford Brown

Thirteen women were inducted into the Texas Women’s Hall of Fame on September 18, 1986. They included astronaut Sally Ride, women’s basketball coach Jody Conradt, business executive Mary Kay Ash, former ambassador Anne Armstrong, rancher Mary Lavinia Griffith, educator and civic leader Ada Simond, educator Wilhelmina Delco, pathologist May Owen, attorney Hermine Dalkowitz Tobolowsky, publishing editor Margaret Cousins, civic volunteers Alicia R. Chacon and Frances E. Goff and journalist Caro Crawford Brown.

Walter Cronkite, Jr., World War II Correspondent

Walter Leland Cronkite, Jr. is not a name that most people would associate with the State of Texas, but he had Texas roots. Walter, Jr. was born November 4, 1916 to Dr. Walter L. and Helen Lena Fritsche Cronkite in Missouri. The surname Cronkite is thought to be derived from a similar sounding Dutch name. However, traditional genealogical sources show that this particular Cronkite family had resided in the United States as far back as the middle 1600s with similar spelling, though for a time it was spelled “Cronkhite,” with an h after the k. Dr. Cronkite was a dentist like his own father had been. The family moved to Houston, Texas when Walter, Jr. was ten years old when Dr. Cronkite had accepted an offer to teach at a local dental school.

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