Legendary DC Anchor Jim Vance is stepping down from the 11PM newscast at the end of the May book. 

Vance has been synonymous with local TV news in Washington for more than 40 years, will step down as the co-anchor of WRC-TV’s 11 p.m. newscast as he makes the slow Anchor march to retirement.

Vance, 73, has been a fixture at NBC-owned WRC, known as “News4,” since 1969, and became an anchorman at the station in 1972. He is also a living link to a formative era of local TV; Vance was among the first wave of African-Americans to anchor a local broadcast, as stations around the country began to integrate their ranks in the early 1970s.

His departure from the late newscast will be the partial end of an era. Vance has appeared on the late broadcast for 43 years, or roughly two-thirds of the station’s entire existence.

He has also been a local celebrity whose battles with, and eventual conquest of, drug addiction were well chronicled in the local media in the 1980s.

He will continue to co-anchor News4’s 6 p.m. broadcast with Doreen Gentzler, his on-air partner since 1989. Gentzler will also continue at 11 p.m., but without Vance.

Vance’s successor at 11 p.m. will be named by the station later Today. 

H/T Washington Post