Tom Ellis departure 1982

["Kevin Vahey" <k-vahey@attbi.com>]

I was mistaken I had forgotten Ellis went directly from 5 to 7

here are snippets from the Boston Globe at the time


     Ellis, WCVB-TV's premier evening news coanchor, will switch to 
WNEV-TV, perhaps as early as August. He resigned from WCVB yesterday 
after four highly successful years in which Channel 5 moved past Channel 
4 into first place in news for the first time.
	
Natalie Jacobson, his Ch. 5 coanchor during the station's rise to the 
ratings leadership, was as stunned as anyone. "I'm surprised," she said 
just before going on camera for the 6 p.m. news. "I've enjoyed working 
with Tom the past four years. I wish him well." Sources at Ch. 5 said 
the relationship between Jacobson and Ellis was never cordial. They said 
Ellis frequently communicated with her by memo rather than speak to 
her.

    In an interview with Boston magazine in October 1979, Jacobson said 
of Ellis, "He puts great emphasis on the details. What he looks like, 
his hair, his clothing and so forth.

    "To me, it's like washing the dishes - just one of the things you 
have to do in life."

    When Ellis came to Boston and Ch. 4 in 1968, he reportedly was signed 
to a healthy contract, which got fatter in two renegotations, reportedly 
reaching $170,000 a year in the early '70s. In 1975, when his salary 
demands reportedly became too big for Westinghouse and Ch. 4, Ellis 
moved to New York and a job with ABC as news anchor on the network's 
local station. At the time, he reportedly signed a three-year contract 
worth $200,000 a year.