Steve Bell (born December 9, 1935) is the former news anchor of ABC News programs Good Morning America and World News This Morning, and professor emeritus of telecommunications at Muncie's Ball State University.
A native of Oskaloosa, Iowa, Bell studied as an undergraduate at Iowa's Central College and went on to earn a master's degree in journalism from Northwestern University. He worked for ABC News from 1967 to 1986; his experiences in Southeast Asia covering the Vietnam War included two hours in detention in Cambodia while investigating a story about an alleged massacre of Vietnamese residents. He first met Ted Koppel during his years in Southeast Asia; the two would go on to become good friends. After his return to America, he began working on Good Morning America, where he would stay for 11 years, eventually rising to the position of news anchor; he left the position in 1986 and moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to co-anchor evening newscasts for KYW-TV. He took up a post as a telecommunications professor Ball State in August 1992, which he enjoyed greatly right from the start. He was inducted into the Indiana Journalism Hall of Fame in 2004. After thirteen years there, he still stated that he didn't really miss his work as a newscaster. He retired from his position at Ball State in 2007.
Bell appeared on Nightline in 2005 to present a report on how China has changed since Mao's rule; he and Koppel had earlier filmed a documentary there during the Mao Zedong era. The Steve Bell News Packaging Scholarship is given each semester at Ball State University to students for students for excellence in television news story packaging.
Famous quotes containing the words steve and/or bell:
“Who is your user, program?”
—Steve Lisberger, U.S. screenwriter, and Steve Lisberger. Dumont (Barnard Hughes)
“I was allowed to ring the bell for five minutes until everyone was in assembly. It was the beginning of power.”
—Jeffrey Archer (b. 1940)