WABC/7 newscaster Gil Noble, dead at 80

Gil Noble, the WABC/7 newscaster who covered the entire spectrum of African-American life and culture over a 44-year career at the station, has died. He was 80.

Channel 7, which announced his death, said he died "peacefully" after a long illness. Noble had suffered from a debilitating stroke in July, but had worked at the station right up until then -- his long-running "Like it Is" still airs Sundays at noon as it has continuously since 1968.

"Gil Noble's life and work had a profound effect on our society and culture," said Channel 7's general manager, Dave Davis, in a statement. "His contributions are a part of history and will be remembered for years to come."

Noble -- a visible presence for years across all of Channel 7's newscasts -- produced thousands of hours of documentaries and interviews under the "Like it Is" banner; in a unique arrangement with the station, he retained ownership of those reports.

"Gil Noble came along at a time when we had black news shows in every city, and the black community as a whole wore its blackness on its sleeve, and he never stopped wearing it on his sleeve," said Richard Prince, author of the blog Journal-isms, which covers news and trends in black journalism for the Robert C. Maynard Institute for Journalism Education.

Born in Harlem, Noble initially had little interest in journalism. An accomplished jazz pianist, Noble wanted to pursue a career in music. But after college he landed a job at a Harlem radio station, where leading figures in the black community, including Martin Luther King Jr., came for interviews. Noble said in an interview. To him, "They were not so much charismatic as they were educational. They told me about myself and my history -- which I didn't get in school."

His "consciousness" of black culture and civil rights was "nil" until then, he said. At first, Noble loathed another famous figure that came to the station, Malcolm X -- "an angry, vitriolic extremist," was how Noble initially described the activist -- but in time Noble came to revere him.

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Noble joined Channel 7 in 1967, and launched "Like it Is" a year later. In time, "Like it Is" became the city's leading public affairs show focused on black politics, culture and life. Its scope wasn't limited to the city, but covered the world. Among those Noble interviewed were President Nelson Mandela, President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Bill Cosby, Harry Belafonte, Lena Horne, Muhammad Ali, Arthur Ashe, Jesse Jackson and Louis Farrakhan.

He also produced documentaries on such figures as W.E.B. Du Bois, Malcolm X and Paul Robeson.

He is survived by his wife, Jean, and five children. Funeral services haven't yet been announced.