NBC Nightly News - Weekend Editions

Weekend Editions

NBC first offered a Saturday evening newscast in 1961, with Sander Vanocur anchoring the NBC Saturday Night Report. Four years later, NBC correspondents Ray Scherer and Robert MacNeil were partnered at the anchor desk on The Scherer-MacNeil Report on Saturdays and continued until 1967. At that time, the network replaced it with a second weekend airing of The Frank McGee Report, which had been airing on Sundays for several years by that point. The Saturday edition of the Report ran for about a year and a half.

On January 4, 1969, the Huntley-Brinkley Report was expanded to Saturday evening, with the main anchors working solo on alternating weeks. When lower-than-expected ratings occurred, the network pulled the pair off Saturdays and assigned others such as McGee and Vanocur. On August 2, 1970, two days after the weekday Huntley-Brinkley ended, the network expanded newscasts to Sunday evenings; this replaced the Sunday broadcast of The Frank McGee Report. For the first year after the Sunday night report began, Chancellor, Brinkley, and McGee rotated as on weeknights; there were no separate weekend anchors.

When Chancellor became sole anchor of the weeknight editions in August 1971, a separate anchor was named for the weekend editions. Weekend anchors have included the following:

• Garrick Utley (1971-1973)
• Tom Brokaw (Saturdays, 1973–1976)
• Floyd Kalber (Sundays, 1973–1975)
• Tom Snyder (Sundays, 1975–1976)
• Cassie Mackin (Sundays, 1976–1977)
• John Hart (Saturdays, 1976–1977; Sundays, 1977–1980 and 1984-1986)
• Jessica Savitch (Saturdays, 1977–1983)
• Jane Pauley (Sundays, 1980–1982)
• Connie Chung (Saturdays, 1983–1984, 1988)
• Chris Wallace (Sundays, 1982–1984, 1986–1987)
• Bob Jamieson (Saturdays, 1984–1987)
• Garrick Utley (Sundays, 1987-1990, Saturdays, 1990-1993)
• Maria Shriver (Saturdays, 1989–1990; Sundays, 1990–1993)
• Brian Williams (weekends, 1993–1999)
• John Seigenthaler (weekends, 1999–2007)

Lester Holt is the current weekend anchor, while Williams anchors the weekend editions if there is major news to report.

Nightly News is the only network evening newscast that airs at the same time on most affiliates, 6:30/5:30 p.m. ET/CT, seven nights a week thus allowing Nightly News to lead into NBC's Sunday primetime lineup at 7/6 p.m. ET/CT (in comparison, some ABC and CBS stations air the Sunday editions of their network's evening newscasts at 6/5 p.m. ET/CT). A small number of NBC affiliates preempt one or both weekend broadcasts; the number was much larger prior to the 1980s.