GOLDEN VALLEY, Minn. - She's walked the path through the hallway to the KARE 11 studio for 32 years -- but on Friday, Diana Pierce did it for the very last time.
With every step she was closer to the end of a long chapter in her life -- and all that much closer to the new adventure that was still ahead.
"I talked to somebody else and they said, “Think you’re going to be a big bawling mess?” I said, “No, I don’t think so …” Pierce said. "I take that all back."
It was 1983 when a California girl signed on at a floundering Twin Cities TV station and slid behind the anchor desk with a guy named Paul Magers. They were leaders of a revolution that took KARE 11 from worst to first … and Randy Shaver had a ringside seat.
"You couldn’t have defined class any better than Diana," Shaver said. "Walking into a situation where the station needed a presence, we needed professionalism, because we were No. 4 in a three-station market, and that’s the truth. When you put Di and Paul together it just clicked."
But Di connected with viewers in places other than the anchor desk. She reported from national political conventions, traveled to Hiroshima, 40 years after a bomb that changed the world and trekked to Africa, where a group of Minnesota doctors was helping save children with heart defects.
At home, Di became a champion for health care issues like breast cancer and blood donation. She got people moving with her popular fitness walks and "Diana Pierce Family Mile and she spent decades hosting KARE’s "11 Who Care" celebration, honoring volunteers who make their communities a better place.
"She connected with people, she connected with the viewer and to be in one TV station for 32 years is very rare, so she obviously connected with the people of Minnesota and Wisconsin," said Ken Barlow.
While her "official" job description will change, much will remain the same for Diana Pierce when she walks out the doors of KARE 11 and into her next big adventure. She will take a sense of curiosity, a ready supply of enthusiasm and plenty of friends and viewers along on that adventure … no matter where it leads.
"I’m not wandering out to pasture … this is just a pause before I do something else," Pierce said. "It’s on to the next thing … and wooo hoooo! We’ll see what it is."