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NGE >> Media >> Broadcasting >> Personalities and Others >> Ted Turner (b. 1938) |
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Ted Turner (b. 1938) In
Early Career Robert Edward "Ted" Turner was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, on November 19, 1938. The family moved to Savannah when Turner was nine years old. He later attended Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, where he was captain of the sailing team. In 1960 Turner went to work for his father's billboard company. Starting his career in Savannah and continuing it in Macon, he assumed control of the fledgling concern when his father committed suicide in 1963. Turner Advertising grew into the fifth largest billboard company in America, and Turner, who moved to Atlanta in 1964, began looking elsewhere for his next challenge. Although Turner rarely watched television, in 1970 he bought WJRJ, a small UHF station in Atlanta that specialized in broadcasting old movies, network television show reruns, and professional wrestling. Beginning in 1973, Atlanta Braves baseball games were added to the station's lineup. Within three years, Turner's "Superstation" was beamed via satellite to homes across the country, making residents from Alaska to Florida fans of the Braves, who became known as "America's Team." In 1979 the station's call letters were changed to WTBS to reflect the company's new name, Turner Broadcasting System. In 1976 Turner bought the Braves team (and spent one day as their manager before Major League Baseball officials ordered him from the dugout) and later bought the Hawks, Atlanta's National
A lifelong sailing enthusiast, Turner's attention returned to the high seas in the late 1970s. After numerous false starts and frustrating losses, Turner's boat Courageous won the 1977 America's Cup. CNN and Turner Broadcasting Soon
Although CNN was not an immediate financial success, it soon became well respected internationally, especially by world leaders, and five years after its inception the operation was profitable. In spring 1985 Turner announced a bid to purchase CBS, one of the "big three" television networks. Although the network was able to buy back enough of its own shares—at a cost of about $1 billion—to thwart a Turner takeover, there is little question that the foray helped boost the Turner name worldwide. It was at this point, however, that Turner made a rare misstep when he bought the famed MGM Studios, which had produced such movies as Gone With the Wind and The Wizard of Oz but had fallen on hard times. Turner paid a reported $1.5 billion for the studio and its extensive film library, but it is widely believed that the package was overvalued. After completing the deal Turner was more than $2 billion in debt, and his Turner Broadcasting empire was in danger. Goodwill Games While Turner battled with bankers and his own board of directors for control of Turner Broadcasting,
Despite the setbacks of the 1986 Goodwill Games, the 1990 games were scheduled for Seattle, Washington. Although Turner lost some $40 million on the Seattle event, the games were held again in St. Petersburg, Russia, in 1994; New York City in 1998; and Lake Placid, New York, in 2000. The final games were held in Brisbane, Australia, in 2001. Later Career and Philanthropy There
After another failed attempt at buying CBS, Turner announced in 1996 that Turner Broadcasting would merge with the media giant Time Warner. This decision effectively signaled the end of his career as a principal in a major company, and Turner gave up the controlling interest in all his properties, including networks and sports teams. By the time
The beginning of the end of Turner's career in communications came in 2000, when Time Warner merged with America Online (AOL) to complete the largest corporate union in history. Although stock prices were high in the beginning, Turner made little secret of his discomfort both with the merger and with the fact that he was not chosen to lead the conglomerate. At one time Turner owned more than $10.7 billion in AOL/Time Warner stock, but in 2003, as stock prices plummeted, Turner sold half of his holdings (at a loss of some $8 billion) and resigned as vice chairman. He continued to serve on the Time Warner board until May 2006, when he resigned at the organization's annual meeting in Atlanta. Turner retained 33 million shares of the company's stock upon his departure. In 2003
Turner remains in the public spotlight through his business and philanthropic activities, as well as his political activism. In late 2004 Turner announced that the Nuclear Threat Initiative would donate $500,000 toward an upgrade of the Global Public Health Intelligence Network. This network, founded by the Canadian government, searches the Internet for unusual health reports around the world and serves as an early warning system for potential disease outbreaks or bioterrorist attacks. In early 2005 Turner again made headlines by attacking the politically conservative Fox News Network, owned by his longtime rival Rupert Murdoch, as a "propaganda voice" for the administration of U.S. president George W. Bush. In March 2005 the American Advertising Federation inducted Turner into the Advertising Hall of Fame, the highest honor in the advertising industry. The following year, Turner received the Delta Prize for Global Understanding, a joint award from Delta Airlines and the University of Georgia, in recognition of "his philanthropic efforts to bring peace and environmental health to our global society." He published his autobiography, Call Me Ted, in 2008. Suggested Reading Ken Auletta, Media Man: Ted Turner's Improbable Empire (New York: Norton, 2004). Porter Bibb, Ted Turner: It Ain't As Easy As It Looks: A Biography (Boulder, Colo.: Johnson Books, 1997). Jeremy Byman, Ted Turner: Cable Television Tycoon (Greensboro, N.C.: M. Reynolds, 1998). Robert Goldberg and Gerald Jay Goldberg, Citizen Turner: The Wild Rise of an American Tycoon (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1995). Richard Hack, Clash of the Titans: How the Unbridled Ambition of Ted Turner and Rupert Murdoch Has Created Global Empires That Control What We Read and Watch (Beverly Hills, Calif.: New Millennium Press, 2003). Janet Lowe, comp., Ted Turner Speaks: Insight from the World's Greatest Maverick (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1999). Reese Schonfeld, Me and Ted against the World: The Unauthorized Story of the Founding of CNN (New York: Cliff Street, 2001). Patricia Sellers, "Ted Turner Is a Worried Man," Fortune, May 26, 2003. Ted Turner, with Bill Burke, Call Me Ted (New York: Grand Central, 2008). Chris Starrs, Athens Updated 1/16/2009 |
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