Andy Rooney 60 Minutes Last Segment - H 2011
Andy Rooney has been hosting 60 Minutes for 30 years, but at the age of 92, he’s finally ready to retire. But that doesn’t mean he’ll be getting soft and letting people have his autograph.
The infamous curmudgeon will sit down with Morley Safer for a 60 Minutes interview to be aired before his regular last appearance on the show on Sunday.
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At one point in the interview, which will cover Rooney’s long career and the character he has become known for, Safer asks Rooney about his personality matching the person he is on air. “I say he’s exactly like that,” Safer tells Rooney. “I’ve been out with you, just walking the street and people come up asking for an autograph.”
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“Oh, what kind of an idiot wants my name on a piece of paper?” responds Rooney. “I still [don’t sign them] and I have no intention of stopping. I just don’t sign autographs.”
Rooney has been at 60 Minutes since the show began in 1968. Rooney’s first essay was about the reporting of automobile fatalities on Fourth of July weekend 1978. That fall, he became a regular essayist on the show. He alternated weeks with James J. Kilpatrick and Shana Alexander. But a year later, he got the end slot to himself.
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Rooney joined CBS in 1949 as a writer for Arthur Godfrey’s Talent Scouts and also wrote for The Garry Moore Show (1959-65) CBS News public-affairs broadcasts including The Twentieth Century, News of America, Adventure, Calendar and The Morning Show with Will Rogers, Jr.
