WPIX announced on Tuesday night’s edition of the 10pm news that legendary news anchor Kaity Tong, who has been a fixture on New York TV since 1981, will be retiring on August 30th. The well-respected news anchor has been at WPIX since 1992 and has been anchoring the news since 1999. Tong has since racked up a slew of accolades in recognition of her work, including induction into the New York State Broadcasters Association Hall of Fame in 2013. The word of her retirement was met with bittersweet reaction from many of her fans and well-wishers, including WOR’s own Larry Mendte, who worked with Tong as a reporter at both WABC and WPIX. On 710 WOR’s Curtis Sliwa and Larry Mendte in the Morning program, Larry shared his memories working alongside a hard-nosed journalist whom he called “just a wonderful, wonderful person”.
Mendte talked about how his colleague wound up as a news reporter by chance, as she actually wanted to be a college professor: “She was a doctoral candidate at Stanford University when she got her first radio job, and then she felt the bug. She said, and she’s told me this before, that she never ever really wanted to get into broadcasting and news. She never thought of it; it kind of just happened, and look at that. She took off and she was absolutely at the top.”
Mendte remembers Tong’s sense of humor popping up when he came to WABC from Columbus and went to dinner with her at a Mexican restaurant: ‘She’s talking to me and she says to me, ‘How are you doing here?’ And I said, ‘I’m a little intimidated. I’m a little nervous.’ She goes, ‘Really? We’re good people here.’ And then, she took a basket of chips and she dumped it over my head [and] she said, ‘Are you feeling less intimidated now?’.”
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