Arriving at the decision to leave the anchor's chair wasn't easy for Lloyd Robertson, the man who has been telling Canadians "what kind of day it's been" for 34 years.

"Getting to that point . . . was the most difficult part," he said Friday, one day after announcing his intention to retire from The CTV National News with Lloyd Robertson in mid-2011.

When he delivers his final sign-off next year, he will pass the chair to television news veteran Lisa LaFlamme, the first woman to permanently anchor a nightly national newscast in Canada.

The road to breaking the glass ceiling for LaFlamme began in 1988, right after graduating from the University of Ottawa.

"I remember the very first day," LaFlamme, 45, said about the day she went to the CTV affiliate in her hometown of Kitchener, Ont. "I went to sit in the lobby of CKCO and I sat there for five hours until the news director would see me . . . And I was given a job."

What she described as a "sympathy job" was a four-hour shift on Saturdays and Sundays, writing news scripts. She eventually became a reporter and anchor, before moving to the CTV network in the late '90s.

There, she covered hard news from the field, reporting on Pope John Paul II's illness and eventual death, the devastation from the tsunami in South Asia and the recent G8 and 20 summits in Toronto.

While she's "humbled and honoured" with her new position, she says she doesn't necessarily consider herself a trailblazer for women in Canadian broadcasting.

"I think my father thought of us as boys for most of our lives," said LaFlamme, who grew up in a family of girls.

"I could be gutting a fish or covering a war . . . It doesn't matter if you're a boy or a girl. I've been taught, and believe in my heart, that hard work and good news judgment really neutralizes the gender issue."

LaFlamme will have time to warm up to her new position while she serves as Robertson's backup before taking over as chief anchor next year.

By the time Robertson, 76, gives reads his final story from CTV's national newsdesk, he will have 35 years of stories to reflect on, some heartwarming, others tragic.

"Nothing can top 9/11," he said. "I was just starting out in TV at the time of the Kennedy assassination, and I remember that quite vividly. But 9/11 was crazier. It seemed you were in the centre of this maelstrom, and you weren't quite sure which way it was turning."

Another enduring memory for Robertson is the Terry Fox Telethon in September 1980.

"Terry had to give up his run at Thunder Bay and go to Vancouver because the cancer had returned," he said. "We picked up the challenge, and raised the money he was trying to raise, and got $10 million in one night of television. This was television doing something that television does best. Reaching out to people and making use of that wonderful medium of ours in a positive manner."

CTV said Robertson — the first journalist to be inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame in 2007 and a member of the Order of Canada — will continue to be seen on the network after 2011, and will continue to co-host CTV's news feature show W5.

Robertson left CBC for CTV in 1976, and joined Harvey Kirck as CTV National News co-anchor.

The timing was difficult, Robertson said, since that same year, Barbara Walters joined Harry Reasoner at ABC News in the United States. "And that duo didn't work at all," Robertson said. "Harry didn't want Barbara there at all, and it showed. Harvey and I were smart enough to realize we had to make this work. Our careers were on the line. If it didn't work, one or the other or the both of us would have been out the door."

And of course it worked, until 1983, when Robertson took over as head of the news program.

Robertson began his broadcasting career in 1952 at a radio station in his hometown of Stratford, Ont., before moving to a station in nearby Guelph, Ont., in 1953.

He jumped to television in 1954 to work for CBC in Winnipeg and then moved to Ottawa, where he served as the national news anchor from 1970-76.

LaFlamme has received five Gemini nominations in the Best News Anchor category and has won several Radio-Television News Directors Association awards for achievements in electronic journalism.

She recently received an honourary doctor of law degree from Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ont., and was awarded the Distinguished Canadian Award from the University of Ottawa.