ABC: Sawyer to replace Gibson as anchor

NEW YORK (AP) — Charles Gibson is retiring as at the end of the year and Diane Sawyer will replace him in January as anchor of ABC’s “World News,” the network said.

Gibson, 66, said he had been planning to retire at the end of 2007 but events compelled him to stay. He was named anchor following the death of Peter Jennings and the wartime injury of Bob Woodruff in 2006. He’s been at ABC News for 35 years and says he plans to continue as an occasional contributor.

Sawyer’s elevation means that, with Katie Couric at CBS, two of the three leading anchors for the broadcast networks will be women.

His comforting presence made him an instant ratings hit at “World News” at a time the other networks had much younger anchors. But NBC’s Brian Williams eventually passed him by and has been leading in the ratings for the past year, with “World News” a solid second.

“The program is now operating at a very accelerated, but steady, cruising speed and I think it is an opportune time for a transition — both for the broadcast and for me,” Gibson said in an e-mail to fellow ABC News staffers. “Life is dynamic; it is not static.”

Sawyer will leave a hole at ABC’s “Good Morning America,” where she was co-host with Robin Roberts. ABC said it had no immediate announcement on what will happen on that show, which is also second in the ratings to NBC.

Gibson’s biggest impact at ABC is when he stepped into the breach during times of need. He had left “Good Morning America,” but the program was imploding in the ratings when ABC News President David Westin asked him and Sawyer to step in as anchors. What was originally envisioned as a stopgap of a few months turned into nearly a decade.

After Peter Jennings’ death from cancer in 2005, Westin replaced him with an anchor team of Woodruff and Elizabeth Vargas. But after Woodruff was seriously hurt in a wartime injury and Vargas became pregnant, Gibson was asked to take over.

“We owe him much for the leadership he gave us when we needed it most,” Westin said.