CNN founder and cable news pioneer Ted Turner dies at 87
Ted Turner, the brash media entrepreneur who remade television journalism by launching CNN in 1980, has died at 87, the network announced.
Ted Turner, the brash media entrepreneur who remade television journalism by launching CNN in 1980, has died at 87, the network announced.
The mustachioed Southerner, a passionate yachtsman and prominent philanthropist, had been living with Lewy Body Dementia, a degenerative disease. His business reach extended well beyond news and into sports clubs and other ventures.
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Cable News Network shattered the conventions of broadcast journalism with its commitment to round-the-clock coverage, then vaulted to worldwide prominence during the 1990-91 Gulf War.
It became the first US television outlet devoted to continuous news, rapidly expanding into a global presence.
CNN’s standing as a must-watch source for breaking events was sealed when it kept correspondents in Baghdad during the US bombardment of the Iraqi capital.
“Ted is the giant on whose shoulders we stand, and we will all take a moment today to recognize him and his impact on our lives and the world,” CNN Worldwide Chairman and CEO Mark Thompson said in a statement.
“He was and always will be the presiding spirit of CNN.”
Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, in November 1938, Robert Edward “Ted” Turner III attended a military boarding school in Tennessee before enrolling at Brown University, where he was expelled before completing his degree.
Turner assumed control of his family’s struggling advertising company after his father, overwhelmed by financial troubles, died by suicide.
He later acquired several radio stations, and his purchase of a struggling Atlanta outlet in 1970 marked his entry into television.
A decade later, that station had become the cornerstone of the national Turner Broadcasting System, whose profits helped finance the debut of CNN.
CNN’s rise helped usher in a new era of television news, paving the way for rival 24-hour channels such as Fox News, founded by Turner adversary Rupert Murdoch, as well as MSNBC and many similar networks around the world.
Turner’s media holdings grew far beyond CNN, encompassing the TBS and TNT channels for sports and entertainment, Turner Classic Movies and Cartoon Network, among others.
Forbes estimates his fortune at $2.8 billion (€2.3bn).