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H. Martin "Marty" Haag, Jr. was the news director at the perennially dominant ABC station, WFAA-TV, in Dallas, Texas from 1973 to 1989. During those 16 years, WFAA won five DuPont-Columbia Awards, more than any other local television news station during that time, and a George Foster Peabody Award in 1988. Haag is considered one of the greatest local TV news directors of all time.
Haag earned his bachelor's degree from the University of Missouri in Columbia, Missouri after attending Texas Christian University for one year. His college roommate at TCU was Jim Lehrer. He earned a Master's degree in Journalism from Columbia University.
Haag began his journalism career in print as an education reporter and editor for The Dallas Morning News during the late 1950s. He then moved to radio as news director at WBAP in Dallas before finding his true niche in television. Haag served first as national assignment editor and overnight manager at NBC News, then worked as an assistant news director at CBS News in New York City before joining a then ratings-impaired WFAA in 1973, becoming their executive news director.
Over the next decades, Marty Haag and WFAA reached national prominence, most notably from their coverage of the Delta Air Lines Flight 191 crash at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport in 1985. CNN carried WFAA's live feed for the entire day.
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