Bill Moyers, the former White House press secretary who became one of television’s most honored journalists, masterfully using a visual medium to illuminate a world of ideas, died Thursday at age 91.

Bill Moyers, a soft-spoken former White House aide turned journalist who became a standard bearer of quality in TV news, died Thursday in New York. He was 91. Moyers’ son William told the Associated Press his father died at Memorial Sloan Kettering hospital after a long illness.

He was a renowned television correspondent and commentator who also had long ties with Lyndon B. Johnson, including as his press secretary.