Mary Calvi’s early path to become an award-winning news reporter and anchor is a familiar one: Calvi ’90 fell in love with journalism at a young age, cultivated an intense curiosity and became determined to cover the news.
Mary Calvi
But it was that curiosity—combined with the confidence acquired through her broadcast journalism classes in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications and a big break provided by Sandy Montag ’85, president of The Montag Group—that helped Calvi realize her childhood dreams while remaining appreciative of the powerful impact of the alumni network.
“I feel indebted to Syracuse University and the incredible alumni connections and the powerful reach of this network of alumni. We’re all so open to connecting and sharing our advice and feedback with each other, and there’s a tremendous camaraderie among the alumni,” says Calvi, a 14-time New York Emmy-winning anchor on WCBS-TV in New York and anchor of “Inside Edition Weekend.”
While her childhood friends were watching cartoons, Calvi vividly remembers being enthralled with the local newscasts. There was something powerful, captivating and mesmerizing about how the on-air reporters delivered the news to Calvi, who grew up in Yonkers, New York.
When she was in the ninth grade, Calvi first got her hands on a microphone and camera and started writing and producing her own newscasts for a small local community television station in her hometown.
“I was doing really local news, talking about the upcoming festival or what was happening in and around town that weekend, but I loved it,” Calvi says. “It was the power of curiosity. I was always curious about what was happening, but also what was the reason behind what was happening.”
Mary Calvi (right) reporting from the scene of a news story for WCBS-TV in New York.
While anyone who watches Calvi deliver the news today can’t help but see her as a natural, it wasn’t until she arrived at Syracuse University to study broadcast journalism that Calvi discovered the confidence she would need to launch her on-air career.
“There was no better journalism school in the country, and there was no other place I wanted to go. But just because I knew this was what I wanted to do from an early age, didn’t mean I actually thought I could do this. It really took me having the real support and encouragement from my Newhouse professors that allowed me to become confident that I could go out and do this for a living,” Calvi says.
Calvi recalls one instance where Dona Hayes, the former department chair and current associate professor of broadcast and digital journalism, challenged her students to report on a breaking news scenario equipped only with a few tidbits of information and some video footage.
“I was terrified, but I ad-libbed my way through the report, and every time I went live afterwards, that experience came in handy. You have to go through the raw emotions of being live in the field to catapult yourself to that next level of reporting, because it really forces you to fix any problems you might have with your on-air delivery or your writing,” Calvi says.
Calvi considers herself to be an adept researcher, someone who is always prepared for that day’s story. But nothing could have prepared her for the challenges of reporting on the tragic events of Sept. 11, 2001.
On that fateful day when terrorists killed nearly 3,000 people and injured more than 6,000 others in the worst attack against the homeland in our nation’s history, Calvi was on the air for 18 consecutive hours, delivering the latest updates to a terrified audience while fielding phone calls from scared citizens frantically searching for their loved ones.
“It’s very difficult to put into words what that day was like. It was devastating and even hard for me now to go to that site. We were just trying to deliver the news as it was happening There was the breaking news piece of it, but also the humanity side of it, the families of those who were lost. It was so difficult. Over the years, I’ve covered every remembrance, and it really doesn’t get much easier for the families,” Calvi says.
The unprecedented events of Sept. 11 really hit home for Calvi, a native New Yorker, who also covered the World Trade Center bombing on Feb. 26, 1993, one of her first-ever on-air news reports. In both instances, knowing there was a priority placed on providing viewers with the most up-to-date information, Calvi was able to demonstrate great empathy while interviewing survivors and family members who had lost a loved one.
“It really hits you hard as a reporter when you talk to those who go through tragedies. We talk about breaking news and getting the story in this industry, but so many of us, especially in a market like New York City, have met families who are dealing with terrible tragedies. The reporter must go to the family of that victim and talk to them. It really changes your perspective about the news business, but also about life in many ways. You really get a true sense of the impact these stories are having that you’re reporting on,” Calvi says.
Relating to the pain of losing a family member or a friend is not a new feeling for Calvi, who was a junior at Syracuse University when terrorists bombed Pan Am Flight 103 on Dec. 21, 1988, killing 270 people, including 35 Syracuse students returning from a semester abroad.
Calvi’s storytelling skills aren’t limited to television. She has found success as a best-selling author, relying on her talents as a reporter to shine a light on two stories of romance involving well-known American presidents.
Mary Calvi’s second book, “If a Poem Could Live and Breathe: A Novel of Teddy Roosevelt’s First Love,” features the actual love letters between Roosevelt and Alice Lee.
Calvi’s first book, “Dear George, Dear Mary,” described how, before George Washington met his eventual wife, Martha, he fell for Mary Eliza Philipse, one of the richest women in America who was from Calvi’s hometown. After sorting through old letters, journal entries and publications from the time, Calvi uncovered the facts that served as the basis for her novel, “an unbelievable story of love, deception and vengeance,” according to Calvi.
Her second book, “If a Poem Could Live and Breathe: A Novel of Teddy Roosevelt’s First Love,” features the actual love letters between Roosevelt and Alice Lee. Those letters were long rumored to have been destroyed or lost to time, but a persistent Calvi eventually discovered not only the letters, but never-before-seen photos of the two lovebirds.
“With both of these books, I knew there was an exclusive story. I wanted to share their stories and their voices with the world because I think they were both wronged in history for many reasons. Mary was named a traitor during the American Revolution, while Alice was marked as someone incapable of intellectual growth. It was quite a thrill being able to share their voices and tell these long-forgotten stories,” Calvi says.
Another case of Calvi’s curiosity paying off.
