Don Shelby Lifts Anchor. Finally.

Image by Max Sparber via FlickrYou thought Don Shelby would never leave.

After several months of tributes and testimonials, the longtime WCCO-TV news anchor said goodbye to his viewers Monday night.  There was a few minutes of the obligatory headlines with co-anchor Amelia Santaniello, but then the rest of the 10 p.m. broadcast was devoted to Shelby.  The Man.  The Legend.

Not even Dave Moore, the patron saint of WCCO news, got this kind of send-off.

But Shelby deserves it.  In his 32-year career at the station, he's won just about every award in journalism and community service.  He's anchored with the likes of Colleen Needles, Pat Miles and Paul Douglas--all of whom returned last week to read the news with him one more time (never mind the circumstances under which they left WCCO in the first place).  And he's kept Channel 4 at or near the top of the local news ratings.

Shelby also had his detractors, stemming from his "Good to Know" commentaries.  Conservatives have dubbed him "DFL Don" and worse.  And when he talked about energy and climate change, he tended to harp on it a bit too much for anyone's taste.

Now the job falls to Frank Vascellaro, who will co-anchor alongside wife Amelia.  This isn't the first time he's had to replace a local news legend.  Vascellaro was the guy who followed Paul Magers at KARE, Channel 11 when Magers moved west to become news anchor at KCBS-TV in Los Angeles.

The world of local TV news now is vastly different from when Shelby began at WCCO.  Back then, there were prime time specials and "Moore on Sunday".  Within the newscasts, there was "Dimension" and the I-Team.  Now, because of corporate beancounters and networks' insistence on affiliates running their entire prime time schedules, we are left with "Good Question" and "Reality Check".  The news set is just a giant window overlooking a busy downtown Minneapolis street.  And on the 6 p.m. newscast, the anchors stand next to banks of monitors.

To paraphrase General Douglas MacArthur:  Old news anchors never die.  They just fade away.  Don Shelby chose to leave because (A) his contract was ending, and (B) he didn't want to be dragged out of the newsroom.  One question remains, now that he's signed off:  Have we really heard the last of Don Shelby?