Maine TV, radio reporter Bob Dyk dies at 71

FALMOUTH – Robert “Bob” Dyk, a longtime Maine broadcaster and a former television network correspondent who covered the hostage crisis in Iran, died Saturday of cancer. He was 71.

Dyk began his career as an editorial assistant with CBS News during coverage of the 1960 Democratic National Convention, his family said.

Through the years, he worked on TV and in radio around the world, covering stories as diverse as the death of Winston Churchill, rioting in Los Angeles and bloodshed in Beirut.

He went to work for ABC News in 1978 and was on the scene for the 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy and the seizure of American hostages in Tehran.

Dyk returned to the U.S. in 1984 and worked briefly at TV stations in his home state of California.

He moved to Maine in 1987 and worked as an anchor and reporter for WMTW-TV and on the radio. For the past few years, he worked as a part-time reporter and anchor at WGAN radio, where he was on the air as recently as last month.

While being treated for his cancer shortly before his death, Dyk would be up organizing a group of other patients and leading a group discussion about having cancer, according to his brother, Jim Dyk of Richmond, Va.

“He was someone you could always call upon, someone who always had time for other people,” Jim Dyk said.

Dyk is survived by his wife of 21 years, Patricia, and their two children.