Tom Brokaw to keep getting work from NBC

Tom Brokaw is leaving his anchor chair, but not NBC.

He signed a 10-year contract Wednesday to remain at the network, largely to produce and narrate documentaries. He’ll also be an analyst on major breaking news events.

Brokaw, 64, is stepping down as anchor of NBC’s “Nightly News” on Dec. 1 and will be replaced in that role by Brian Williams.

“To a lot of people that meant I was going to sit around in an old anchorman’s home with a lap robe and a drool cup,” Brokaw said. “But I never intended to stop working.”

He’s been an NBC employee since 1966, starting as a reporter at the network’s Los Angeles affiliate. Brokaw has been sole anchor of “Nightly News” since 1983 and NBC’s main anchor on major news events.

Brokaw will be the first of the broadcast networks’ Big Three — with Peter Jennings of ABC and Dan Rather of CBS — to leave that role. All have been in place for more than two decades.

He already regularly produces documentaries and said he has four in the works now: on health care, politics, D-Day and a hiker who lost his arm. The South Dakota native has a second home in Montana equipped with a soundproof room where he can record voiceovers for his documentaries.

Brokaw, author of “The Greatest Generation,” about the people who fought World War II, also plans to continue his writing career.