Norwalk High School
Alumni Association
Norwalk, CT

Norwalk high grad makes name as television news anchor in Boston

By FRANCES X. FAY

Hour Senior Staff Writer

She has become a familiar television face to audiences in the Greater Boston area after more than a quarter century.

Pam Cross has made that impression as the weekend news anchor for WCVB-TV, Channel 5, for half that time after serving as a general assignment reporter for the same station.

The Norwalk High School Class of 1971 alumna covered all types of stories for WCVB-TV, the ABC-TV affiliate in The Hub, from politics to urban crime to entertainment features before moving into the anchor chair.

These and other accomplishments will merit installation of the Norwalk native on the NHS Wall of Honor at 3 p.m. Sunday during the 13th annual NHS Alumni Association dinner at Continental Manor.

Cross, who admits to being a "news junkie," became enamored of television journalism as an adolescent growing up on Starlight Drive adjacent to Wolfpit School.

"There was a handsome black news reporter on a New York City station named Bob Teague," she recalled. "That gave me a boost because I figured that if a black man could do it, there was a chance that I could, too."

She began learning how to put a news story together as a reporter and then an editor for Bear Tracks, the NHS newspaper.

"Seeing my byline in that paper gave me identity and I realized the power of the press when students responded."

She also worked on the class yearbook when she wasn't performing or rehearsing with the school choir.

She continued to learn at a University of Bridgeport summer school program and during her four years at Emerson College in Boston where she majored in speech.

Cross began her professional career at Radio Station WSTC in Stamford in 1975 after working at the station during summer vacations. A year later, she moved to Radio Station WDRC in Hartford, a top 40 outlet known as "Big D." Another year later, found her at WFSB-TV, Channel 3, in Hartford, where she worked four years on general assignments such as consumer finance and education, occasionally doing weekend anchor stints.

While there, she met and became a friend of another Norwalk native, Emily Rooney, daughter of "60 Minutes" commentator Andy Rooney, who has had her own award-winning interview show on WGBH-TV, Channel 2, in Boston for a decade after previously working with Cross.

"Pam is the most even-keeled person I've ever worked with in my life," Rooney said week. "She is absolutely never non-plussed. She's a great reporter because she doesn't let anything get to her."

Cross admits that her tranquility is occasionally ruffled.

"Talking with parents of children killed by violence has been my most difficult task in this business," she said this week.

She has been an active volunteer with several organizations around Boston, devoting a decade to the city's YWCA. She was also a pivotal co-chairman of a Habitat project in which she and scores of women built a three-bedroom home in Brockton, Mass., for a single mother of two sons. She also helps community groups as an emcee at events, giving speeches and strategic media advice. She has spent hundreds of hours speaking to students in public and private schools about the importance of setting goals and working toward them, and about African-American heritage and pride. She also works on issues relating to women and young people and mentors college students interested in journalism careers.

Cross has been an officer of the Boston Association of Black Journalists. While in Hartford, she had been a founder of the Russwurm-Wells Society, another chapter of the National Association of Black Journalists. She was also a catalyst for bringing hundreds of Emerson College alumni back to Boston in 2000 for her class's 25th anniversary reunion.

"I've been a colleague of Pam's since 1981," said Karen Holmes Ward, director of public affairs for WCVB-TV. "She is a the consummate professional who not only handles her position thoroughly and accurately, but also finds the time to help in a manner that has made her a beloved member of the Boston community."

Among the honors presented Cross have been the Emerson College Alumni Service Award, the YMCA Black Achievers Award, the Massachusetts Black Legislative Caucus Citation, the Boston Association of Black Journalists Award and the recognition of the Boston Public Schools.

When born the daughter of the late Calvin C. and Marie Sellers Cross, her family was living at 23 Chapel Street behind St. Mary Church, where they operated a laundry in the adjacent building. Her father, who was somewhat involved in local Republican politics as a sheriff and appointed member of a couple of city agencies, later owned and operated a Mobil gasoline service station at West Avenue and Reed Street, next to the old Austin Chevrolet Agency. She has two older living siblings, a sister, Phyllis Barnwell, of Raleigh, N.C., and a brother, Master Sgt. Major Calvin C. Cross Jr., of Havelock, N.C.

She has been married 31 years to Ronald Ancrum, a Stamford native who is president of Associated Grant Makers, an organization that helps its member organizations obtain grants. They have a daughter, Erica, a 23-year-old graduate of Hampton University doing administrative work at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

After more than three decades as a radio and television journalist, Cross admits to "still feeling the adrenaline when a story is breaking and I want to be the first on the air with accurate details." She also enjoys those stories that "shed light on people or situations that might not otherwise have been reported."

But she remains disturbed by how much violence exists in the world today.

"Somehow, we've got to place greater emphasis on how important life is, and we've got to teach people to resolve differences with tools other than weapons."

Email: NHSAA@hotmail.com