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Associated Press

Some public figures are honoured with namesake buildings or monuments. Veteran broadcaster Connie Chung has a strain of marijuana and hundreds of Asian-American women as legacies.
Chung was contacted five years ago by a fellow journalist, Connie Wang, whose Chinese immigrant parents gave her the chance as a child to pick an Americanised first name. She thought of Connie, after the pretty woman she saw on television, and also suggested some random cartoon characters.
Her parents chose wisely.
After reaching university, Wang learned she was part of a special sorority. There were all sorts of Asian-American Connies around her, many given the name by parents who saw Chung as a smart, accomplished woman whose professional success their daughters could aspire to.
Until Wang told her this, Chung had no idea.
“I was flabbergasted,” she said. “I’m not a crybaby, and I really bawled.”

Clearly, a career in television news had a greater impact than she knew. Chung, now 78, tells stories about her life in a new memoir 10 years in the writing titled – what else? – Connie.
She dishes and, yes, names names. The US presidential candidate who made a pass at her. The actor who gravitated to Asian women. The male anchor who long held a grudge against her.
Off the air for several years now, she lives a comfortable retired life with her husband, television personality Maury Povich. Between her absence and a tarring with more of a reputation as a celebrity journalist than she ever wanted, Chung is often overlooked.
Every day was a test, because I was a woman and because I was a minority, but more because I was a woman. There were no skirts in my business
Connie Chung
Not by Wang and other Connies. Few Asian-Americans had the name before Chung and few since, but “from the late 1970s to the mid-1990s, that’s the Connie generation”, she said. A frequent argument for diversity in the workplace is so young people can see themselves in prominent roles; rarely do you come across such a tangible example of its effect.
Shortly after writing about the phenomenon, Wang said she personally heard from at least 100 Connies with similar stories, probably a small sample of what is out there.
“There was quite literally no one else like her,” Wang said. “She was very professional, she was tough but also beautiful. What drew my mother to her was also her style. She cared so much about her appearance.”
Chung was the 10th child – the only one born in the United States – of Chinese parents whose marriage had been arranged when they were 12 and 14 and met five years later on their wedding day.
We’ve come a long way, but the thing that is disturbing to me is that we really haven’t come that long a way. The sexism still exists
Connie Chung
No son survived past infancy, so her father beseeched her to bring honour to the family name when she began her career. Instead, it turned out to be Connie – shortened from Constance – that became inspirational.
Quickly out of university and two years in local news, Chung earned a job at US news broadcaster CBS News, in part because there was pressure in the late 1960s and early 1970s to make television a little less of a white man’s world.
“I always had to prove myself,” Chung recalled. “Every day was a test, because I was a woman and because I was a minority, but more because I was a woman. There were no skirts in my business.”
Her hustle earned respect, with her willingness to stay up virtually all night covering American politician George McGovern’s 1972 presidential campaign resulting in a scoop on his vice-presidential choice.

She had to prove herself to older men and dodge predators, once publicly rejecting a suitor with a sly nod to an old cliché about Chinese food not keeping one sated for long: “You don’t want to go to bed with me,” she said. “You’ll just be h***y an hour later.”
She feels that young people need to hear stories about sexism and racism she encountered.
“We’ve come a long way, but the thing that is disturbing to me is that we really haven’t come that long a way,” she said. “The sexism still exists. The racism for Asians has reared its ugly head in a most depressing way.
“Looking back, it’s important to me that women and minorities know that things have changed, but not enough.”
From the memoir, it is clear that she remembers most fondly those days of covering hard news, from the Watergate political scandal to businessman Nelson Rockefeller’s brief tenure as US vice-president.

Chung became a news anchor in Los Angeles and, in the 1980s, at NBC News. Yet she said she was saddled too often with what were considered “women’s stories”, about miniskirts at the beginning of her career to celebrity profiles and tabloid fodder at NBC.
Too often, she says, she accepted assignments that she really did not want to cover. Her reputation suffered. Secretly, she agreed with some of the criticism, but it was not easy seeing influential television critic Tom Shales call her “Connie Fun”.
“I never wanted to be called the ‘b-word’,” she said. “I never wanted to be called a diva. So I cooperated a lot. I think that’s a Chinese thing and a woman thing.
“I was a double dose of dutiful, so it was as much my own doing by agreeing to do things that my higher-ups wanted me to do.”

She moved back to CBS News and, with fellow journalist Dan Rather struggling in the ratings as CBS Evening News anchor in 1993, was named his co-anchor. It seemed like a career peak, but Chung wrote that she had an inkling of what was to come in her first meeting with Rather, when he said: “Now you are going to have to start reading the newspaper.”
Chung writes in Connie: “I wanted to believe I had been chosen because I deserved the job. I must have been dreaming. They wanted me to put a bow around Dan Rather’s neck that would make him appear friendly and cuddly and normal.
“But instead, it was I who ended up in a noose.”
The ill-fated partnership lasted two years before Chung got the axe. She chose not to accept CBS’ offer of a face-saving role, instead throwing herself into raising Matthew, the infant she and Povich adopted.

Later moving on to ABC News, she found some satisfying work with some newsier investigations. She accepted a prime-time anchor’s job at CNN, but that proved short-lived. Her television career was winding down.
Chung recently found out, from her niece, about her other namesake – the Connie Chung strain of marijuana. Ever the journalist, she dived into research, finding a pack of five pre-rolled joints available online for US$22.
Asked if Connie Chung has tried the Connie Chung brand, she politely demurred, then later volunteered that she had not smoked marijuana since university, effectively answering the question. But she took pride in reading about the characteristics of Chung weed.
“I’m easy to grow,” she said. “I create a lovely flower and one of my favourite parts is that I’m low-maintenance. I find that very admirable, although I don’t think Maury would agree that I’m low-maintenance.”


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US journalist Connie Chung’s legacy? A generation of Asian-American girls named after her

Former US television journalist Connie Chung at the 50th Annual Daytime Emmy Awards in 2023. Hundreds of Asian-American women have been named after her, she learned a few years ago from one of them. Photo: Getty Images

Connie Wang (pictured) says she named herself after US journalist Connie Chung. Photo: Instagram/@conconwang

Connie Chung as a CBS News reporter at the age of 25 in 1972. Photo: Getty Images

Chung in 1977. She was the 10th child of Chinese parents whose marriage had been arranged when they were 12 and 14. Photo: Getty Images

CBS Evening News with Dan Rather and Chung in 1993. Photo: Getty Images

The cover of Chung’s book. Photo: Hachette

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Culture

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Film & TV

Connie Chung, so ubiquitous on American TV news that hundreds of Asian-American women have been named after her, tells all in a new memoir


Connie Chung, so ubiquitous on American TV news that hundreds of Asian-American women have been named after her, tells all in a new memoir.


Asian diaspora

Asian-Americans

United States