Connie Chung, an icon of broadcast journalism and the first woman of Asian descent to break barriers as anchor of a major American evening news program, looked back on the sexism she faced in her early days in the profession.

In an upcoming CBS Sunday Morning In the interview with Jane Pauley, which airs this weekend, Chung, 78, recalls a moment with John Mitchell, then attorney general in the Richard Nixon administration, during a 1974 interview on Capitol Hill, when he remarked to the young Chung that she looked “prettier than ever.”

“John Mitchell seems to know who Connie is,” Pauley says after playing an archive clip of the encounter.

“Ugh,” Chung says, exasperated. “I remember this, Jane. He looks at me and says, ‘You look so pretty.’ And I think, ‘What?’ I’m not a lollipop. I’m not an ice cream cone. Can you please treat me like the other male reporters?”

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The veteran journalist sits down with Pauley on Sunday’s show to talk about the obstacles she faced as a young reporter in male-dominated news programs and also opens up about the racism she experienced. She is also preparing for the release of her upcoming memoir Connie (out September 17), which reveals everything about her four-decade career.

An excerpt published by CBS News before their meeting went into more detail about her encounter with Mitchell and the men in politics and government. She wrote that they “looked her up and down and greeted me with a look as if she were a little porcelain doll.”

“Did he expect me to smile and thank him?” Chung writes of Mitchell. “I was here to do my job and continued with my questions. The same was true of Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. When I approached him with my microphone in hand, he flirted. There was not much I could do or say to avoid these creepy old men.”

In an interview with the Harvard Business Review published this month, Chung said she was “determined to succeed” in a field that is predominantly white men. “I couldn’t act quite as self-righteous as she did, but I mustered the same confidence that I felt I needed as a journalist to push myself forward,” she said. “It was a fine line to walk, making sure I never got called the B-word.”

“But I had a great sense of humor and talked like a sailor, and the men really didn’t know what to make of it, because there I was, this delicate little flower, talking just like them,” Chung added. “I think they were really surprised that I had accepted their role. It was a time when sexism and racism were rampant, but I found a way to get them before they could get me.”

For more on Chung, watch her interview with Pauley on Sunday.