Getting Real

by Gretchen Carlson

  In the months before I returned to Stanford, I kept up the pace of meeting people, hoping that having been Miss America would open doors for me after I graduated from college. I wasn’t prepared for the environment I encountered trying to break into television news. In the world of music, where I spent my formative years, we were judged solely on our talent, and gender wasn’t a factor. It had never occurred to me, because I hadn’t experienced it, that there were people who thought women weren’t equal to men in the workplace—much less that some men would try to take advantage of me.

  Early on I went to New York to meet with a top television executive I was told could help me. He spent a lot of time with me that day. He called a bunch of shows for me while I was sitting in the office and said, “I’m here with this great young girl. You got to take a look at her. She has a lot of talent.” He smiled at me across the desk, and I smiled back, thinking how lucky I was to have such a powerful advocate. Later, he took me out to dinner, where he started imparting “valuable” career advice, including the suggestion that I change my name to “Kristin” for TV. I thought that was strange. Not only is Kristin my sister’s name, but I was already pretty well known as Gretchen.

  Afterward we got into his car and he gave the driver the address of the friend I was staying with. We were sitting in the backseat together when suddenly he threw himself on top of me and stuck his tongue down my throat. He was all over me, and I can still feel his mouth on my mouth. It makes me a little sick even now. I pulled away from him, desperate to get away. Luckily, we were close to where I was being dropped off. I jumped out of the car and slammed the door without a word, racing into my friend’s apartment building. When I got upstairs I broke down and sobbed to my friend Chele. Why would he do that? I thought he respected me. I thought he truly wanted to help me. I was so confused about who I was and what I would face as I moved forward in what appeared to be a really scary world.

  How could this happen?

  But it did happen—and not only that night in New York. A few months later I was in Los Angeles meeting with a top public relations executive about how to parlay my Miss America experience into a news media career. He suggested we get some dinner. As I got into the passenger seat of his car, he suddenly put his hand on the back of my head and shoved my face into his crotch. Sickened, I yanked myself up and sat frozen, not knowing what to do. This was a very powerful man, and I felt powerless. Somehow I got through the dinner—I’m embarrassed to say I didn’t flee, although in that unfamiliar setting I’m not sure where I would have gone. But I spent sleepless nights wondering what I should do next. Should I tell someone? I thought of the innocent young women who would be crossing these high-profile predators’ paths, and it upset me. But whom could I tell? Who would believe me? In my heart I knew that such a he-said, she-said scenario would never favor me. These men were just too powerful. I imagined myself being characterized as a tease, a liar, and worse, and I was frozen with terror. I’m not proud of it, but I stayed silent.

  It might seem like a minor event in the retelling, but it had a lasting effect, almost like post-traumatic stress. Many years later, when I was well established, working at Fox News, I saw the PR executive walk past my office door, and I was immediately transported back to that car with my face in his crotch. When he’d gone by, I waited a minute and then jumped up and shut the door so he wouldn’t see me. When it was time to leave, I peeked out in the hall to be sure the coast was clear and then ran for the elevator.

  Looking back, I see that although these executives might have been genuinely trying to get me a job, they expected something in return. I’d never experienced that before. It was a very uncomfortable wake-up call, but I put these incidents behind me. I knew this sort of thing happened to women, but I wasn’t about to let it destroy my confidence or darken my perspective of the world. Two guys who were jerks—I could handle that. But how many other women had this happened to? And if we all said nothing, what does that mean? Have times changed for women? I hope so, but I’m not sure.

  During those months I was still booked for a number of appearances, now as the former Miss America. I didn’t mind, figuring that the exposure would be positive. At one of the most memorable appearances, I ended up with my hair on fire! Good Morning America had booked me for December 13, which was Santa Lucia Day. In my Swedish heritage, this day involves a very special tradition in which a young woman representing Saint Lucia wears a crown of lit candles during a ceremony. It’s very beautiful, and we used to do it as kids at our grandparents’ Christmas tea, with either Kris or me playing the role of Saint Lucia. One of us would wear the crown and a white robe with a red sash and walk slowly down the stairs in the house while the others sang the hymn “Santa Lucia.” The Swedish Institute pitched Good Morning America to show the ceremony, with me as Saint Lucia and a choir of young girls, dubbed the Lucia Maidens, singing.

  I was game. Now, that’s a lot of fire to carry on your head, and when we did it as kids we always put a wet cloth underneath in case any wax dripped. I guess they skipped the wet cloth on Good Morning America, because as I reverently walked down the steps on live TV, a smile pasted on my face and the girls singing behind me, I felt a burning sensation and thought, “My hair is on fire!” I made it through the segment without screaming, but when they took off the crown my hair was clotted with huge clumps of hot wax. They sent me to Vincent, and he sat there with peanut butter and oil, trying to remove the wax. He ended up having to cut off chunks of my hair when he couldn’t get all the wax out. It was a close call, and I could only think, “The things we do to get our foot in the door!”

  I was glad when it was time to return to Stanford. I was proud to have won the $30,000 scholarship money and was able to pay my way for the remaining time there. My parents were going to have four kids in college, and it meant the world to me that I could help out, thanks to Miss America.

  By that point I welcomed a period of anonymity. I lived in an apartment by myself off campus. I didn’t really know anybody, because my classmates were long gone by the time I returned. I still remember my first day back, walking across campus wearing jeans, a T-shirt, and tennis shoes—with no makeup. It was liberating, and I felt exhilarated—excited to be back to my studies, back to being normal. I hit the books with new fervor, eager to graduate and get started on my career.

  One of the first classes I signed up for—to broaden my horizons—was one in feminist studies. I’m sure my classmates, had they known who I was, would have been surprised to find a recent Miss America in their midst. For me, it was a cathartic experience, a way to decompress after a year when I’d sometimes struggled to be myself in spite of an avalanche of expectations and stereotypes. Even the professor didn’t know who I was—until I handed in a paper about being Miss America. My paper contained some deep emotional truths about my experience and the perceptions many people had—especially their high expectations and the tendency to objectify Miss America. I got an A on the paper, but amazingly I don’t recall the professor ever saying anything to me about what I’d written. So I remained anonymous.

  When I graduated (with honors), I began making the rounds to television stations in Minnesota. One of the first places I went was KSTP in Minneapolis, the local ABC affiliate. I thought I had an inside track there. After I was Miss America, and before I returned to Stanford, I’d been hired as a freelance contributor doing neighborhood stories. I also had the great opportunity to fill in on the show Good Company, which was hosted by the husband-and-wife team Sharon Anderson and Steve Edelman. Everyone said I did well, so I hoped I might get a job there. It made perfect sense to me as a launching point.

  I had a strong pitch for why I would be an asset to the station. I walked in and gave my pitch to the news director, and he turned me down flat. “Sorry,” he said. “You don’t have the experience.” I thought my time on Good Company, my experience as Miss America, and especially being a hometown girl would help me get
a job, but the truth of the matter was, I didn’t really have a lot of TV know-how for a top-twenty market. And life experience didn’t necessarily translate to TV proficiency.

  That crushing response is one that college graduates are very used to hearing. It’s the impossible conundrum: You can’t get hired without experience, and you can’t get experience without being hired. The thing is, by then I thought I had a pretty strong portfolio for a twenty-three-year-old.

  I went home that night feeling lost and completely blindsided. I sobbed all night in my bed. It was a rude awakening. Being a celebrity didn’t mean anything in the real world. Later, even with a long career under my belt, I realized when looking back that nothing in TV ever came easily for me. I’ve fought for every opportunity, and I’ve never received that golden call from out of nowhere that changed everything. I accept that now, and it makes me work all the harder, but as a young woman starting out I was shaken by how difficult it was. I thought, “If I can’t get a job in my hometown market, where everyone knows me, what hope is there for my career?” I felt discouraged, realizing that once again I was starting at the bottom rung of the ladder and it would be a long climb.

  Once I picked myself up and dusted off my hurt ego, I kept plugging away, trying to present a polished, professional persona. One after the other, the local stations turned me down. Then Jody Lomenzo, who had helped me write speeches as Miss America, worked with me to put together a tape of some of my interviews, my PM Magazine anchoring, my Good Company segments, and even my Bloopers tape. I had no idea how to go out and find a TV job in the real world, but Jody lived in Virginia, and one day she called to tell me she’d heard that a reporter job was open at a station in Richmond.

  That’s when I encountered Wayne Lynch, the news director for WRIC-TV in Richmond, Virginia, who told me he probably wouldn’t hire me because I was a former Miss America. I took it as a challenge. Richmond was a long way from home, but by then I was used to making sacrifices to achieve a goal, and I was determined to get my foot in the door wherever that might be. I sent my tape by Federal Express. I hoped Wayne Lynch could see through my inexperience—and his bias about my being Miss America—and spot my potential.

  After he got my tape and watched it, Wayne called me a few days later and his tone had changed. Now he said he was interested in hiring me, and he asked me to come and see him in Richmond. In spite of Wayne’s initial reluctance, I always felt grateful to him for giving me my start in journalism. He saw my potential, and I was determined to prove him right.

  At last, a job!

  Chapter 6

  The Work I Love

  My first job in television started with me peeing in a cup.

  I flew to Richmond to meet Wayne, and he picked me up at my hotel early in the morning to take me to breakfast. After we had driven for a while, Wayne suddenly pulled up in front of a medical lab and stopped the car.

  “What are we doing?” I asked uneasily.

  He looked a little chagrined. “Yeah, well, we’re going to breakfast. But first you have to go into the lab and take a drug test. They make you urinate into a cup.” Wayne kept his eyes straight ahead, but I detected a faint blush creeping over his face.

  “What?” I was shocked. All I could think was, “It’s seven o’clock in the morning!” But I was a trouper. I sighed, jumped out of the car, and went into the lab. It was the first—and last—time I was ever drug tested. I returned to the car and we went to breakfast.

  I guess I passed the drug test, because I was hired for a two-year contract for the princely sum of $18,000 the first year, with a raise to $20,000 in the second. Wayne took me on a tour of the station, and I was very impressed because they had just built a whole studio in the suburbs of Richmond. Everything was very modern and state of the art. I was aware that people were sizing me up as I walked around with Wayne. They knew I’d been Miss America, and I figured some of them were wondering if I was a blonde bimbo. Wayne was still defensive about my past. Asked by a local newspaper if he’d hired me because I was Miss America, he said, “I hired her as a reporter. We’re really trying to stay out of the Miss America business here.” I had that in mind when I cut my hair to an inch long all the way around shortly after I started the job. It looked awful, and I didn’t intend for it to be so short! But I was trying to start fresh on my new adventure.

  My first job was to report for “Neighborhood News,” a twice-weekly feature on the local community. It was mostly good news reporting, showing all the wonderful people who were doing things that mattered. The fact is, viewers love hearing good news. They get tired of the fires and murders and robberies.

  Writing scripts in 1990 could be an arduous process, because we were still using typewriters and carbon paper. There was the top sheet, white, then the black carbon sheet, then a pink sheet, a blue sheet, and a yellow sheet. The production assistants sat at long tables and ripped scripts. If you made even one mistake, the whole thing would have to be done over, or you could laboriously use Wite-Out on each copy. The old technology added hours to an already full schedule. We were relieved when we got computers in 1991.

  In my first months at WRIC I lived in a small one-bedroom apartment. My furniture consisted of a futon I’d had in college, a stair climber, and a table and chairs. It wasn’t exactly nesting. I came home every night dead tired, ordered pizza, and plugged my TV into the single wall outlet. There were no ceiling lights, so until I got a lamp I ate by the light of the bathroom and TV. I didn’t know anybody, and it was a bare-bones existence, but my work consumed me.

  I was like every other young woman beginning a career. I poured everything into my work, just as I had always done. The discipline I learned as a girl was now turned toward my job, and it was all I thought about.

  Looking back to our early careers, we don’t always recall that intense feeling of fear and anticipation that goes with being green. You step into an unfamiliar world. Every moment is loaded with meaning. Every decision seems do-or-die—especially if you’re in an intensely competitive field like broadcasting. I was always aware that I had to prove myself every day, and I figured that if I couldn’t be the most seasoned journalist, I’d be the hardest working.

  In short order I graduated to the crime beat. I got out and started visiting crime scenes and cold-calling for comments. I faced daily rejection. When you’re trying to get people to talk to you, nine out of ten say no. It was a high-stress business, because I was always conscious of needing to get the story. The pervasive thought in my head was, “If I lose this story I’m dead.”

  People on the phone seemed to have a very hard time getting my name straight, which tickled me. In Minnesota, Carlson is a very common name—it’s the fattest section in the phone book. Suddenly my name was unfamiliar. When I called and left messages in Richmond, most often the people on the phone would say, “Gretchen what? Carlton?” I got a kick out of that. I stood out.

  I was on the beat every day, racing around the city, and I quickly overcame my lifetime problem with carsickness. I’d be bouncing along in a speeding car, usually with a cameraman at the wheel, writing scripts on a notepad, and there just wasn’t time for throwing up. I practiced mind over matter, and eventually it took. Some of the cameramen smoked, and occasionally I’d bum a cigarette to settle my nerves.

  A significant amount of my time was spent covering executions, because they had a lot of executions in Virginia. I did interviews with the people who were going to be put to death, and it made an indelible impression on me. I can remember peering through the glass partition as I interviewed men (it was always men during my time reporting) who were scheduled to die. One of my memorable interviews was with Roger Keith Coleman, a coal miner who was on death row after being convicted of the rape and murder of his sister-in-law. He never stopped proclaiming his innocence, and he had a huge support network. Governor Douglas Wilder received thousands of letters in favor of clemency, which he denied. Co
leman even made the cover of Time magazine, with the headline “This Man Might Be Innocent.” I spoke to him the day of his scheduled execution, while he was awaiting word from the Supreme Court. That morning he had taken a lie detector test in a last-ditch effort to clear his name. He told me, “I will fight to prove I’m innocent until I’m either free or dead.” He failed the lie detector test and the Supreme Court refused to issue a stay. Hours later he was dead. Many people continued to believe in Coleman’s innocence, but a decade later, DNA tests on semen from the rape confirmed his guilt.

  When I interviewed the prisoners, it was usually about the appeals process and what they were doing to try to stay their executions. The lawyers were always angling to get a lot of press, but I would also talk to the families of the victims, and their stories often moved me to tears. It was an emotional roller coaster. I felt the grief of the families, yet, sitting behind that glass partition, I would think, “I’m looking at a man who will be dead in a week.” Or sometimes the very next day.

  I never personally witnessed an execution, although I put my name on the list and wanted to. But I did everything else. I was allowed to get video of the execution cell, which was located close to the death chamber. One time I went in to get shots of the electric chair, which they called Old Sparky, and they were conducting a dress rehearsal for an execution. The sound of the chair revving up was chilling. Minutes later, as I was sitting at the glass partition interviewing the man who would be executed the next day, he asked, “What’s that noise?” I winced at the question, but replied honestly, “It’s the chair.”