I would say that anybody who went into TV news in the 70s or 80s had Walter Cronkite in mind when they began. 
Like the generation before him who idolized Ed Murrow, Cronkite’s time came-and-went in the TV news business, but it is with great respect and fond memories that we bid farewell to Cronkite today.
Cronkite, along with local guys like Don McCune (in my Seattle-based case) or Jim Harriott or Charlie Herring were a sort of starting point for people who got started in the business with the intention of doing something similar. It’s always hard to hear about them fading to black.
