Bill Moyers, the author and journalist who first rose to national prominence as press secretary for President Lyndon B. Johnson, has died at 91, the Associated Press reports.

Moyers was born in Hugo, Oklahoma, and raised in Marshall, Texas. He was educated at the University of North Texas and the University of Texas at Austin, where he studied journalism, and worked as an assistant news editor and a Baptist preacher before taking a job helping establish the Peace Corps in the John F. Kennedy administration.

Moyers later worked as a special assistant, then press secretary, to Johnson after Kennedy’s assassination. He became publisher of the Long Island newspaper Newsday after leaving the government, and later worked for the news divisions of CBS, NBC, and PBS. He hosted the PBS show Bill Moyers Journal from 1972 to 1976, 1979 to 1981, and 2007 to 2010, along with dozens of documentaries and specials for the network.

He published his first book, Listening to America: A Traveler Rediscovers His Country, in 1971. Several more followed, including The Power of Myth, co-written with Joseph Campbell; A World of Ideas; Healing and the Mind; Genesis: A Living Conversation; and Bill Moyers Journal: The Conversation Continues.

Moyers was remembered on social media. On the platform X, former Vice President Al Gore wrote, “Bill Moyers was an exceptional journalist and public servant who championed truth and democracy. As America and the world began to recognize the escalating climate crisis in the 1990s, he reported on the need to care for the environment. Bill’s friendship was an extraordinary gift that will be deeply missed. In these challenging times for our country, let us honor his legacy by acting with moral urgency and decency.”

And HuffPost co-founder Arianna Huffington posted, “I love Bill Moyers. He was a true public servant in every sense of the word. With his storytelling, compassion and curiosity, he showed how journalism can move people’s hearts and minds. Including mine—his series on Joseph Campbell was so important for me when it first came out in 1988. I just watched it again last month and it is still as relevant as ever.”

Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.