Son of Canadian journalist Charles Jennings, got start in broadcasting at age 9 as the host of a Saturday-morning children's show on CBC Radio called Peter's People; his father disapproved because it smacked of nepotism
Dropped out of high school at 16 and went to work as a bank teller for the Royal Bank of Canada
Returned to Canadian broadcasting for good in the late 1950s, including a stint as the host of Club Thirteen, a dance show similar to American Bandstand, but also as a news anchor
Hired by ABC in 1964, and in 1965 became the anchor of Peter Jennings With the News, a 15-minute newscast that competed against—and lost to—Walter Cronkite on CBS, and Chet Huntley and David Brinkley on NBC
Left the anchor desk in 1967 to become a foreign correspondent, covering noteworthy events such as the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, and in 1978 became the London anchor for ABC's World News Tonight
Succeeded the late Frank Reynolds as sole anchor (and senior editor) of World News Tonight, a position he would hold—and be known as one of the Big 3, with NBC's Tom Brokaw and CBS' Dan Rather—until his final broadcast on April 5, 2005, when he announced he had lung cancer
Became a U
S
citizen on May 2003, but also retained his Canadian citizenship
With Todd Brewster, coauthor of several books, including The Century (1998) and In Search of America (2002)