Kids of the 90s would have surely grown watching Cartoon Network, a major kids channel, a contribution to the media world by the founder of the renowned news channel CNN and a major philanthropist, Ted Turner, who has passed away on Wednesday at the age of 87.
In 1980, Turner, who is widely regarded as the pioneer of the 24-hour network that revolutionised television news, also launched Cable News Network as the first dedicated rolling news channel, which soon became a central part of the media landscape.
US President Donald Trump paid tribute to him as “one of the greats of broadcast history, and a friend of mine”.
Current CNN CEO and chairman Mark Thompson described Turner as “the giant on whose shoulders we stand, and we will all take a moment today to recognise him and his impact on our lives and the world”.
“He was and always will be the presiding spirit of CNN.”
The Ohio-born Atlanta businessman was also known as “The Mouth of the South” for his outspoken nature. He built a media empire that encompassed cable’s first superstation and popular channels for movies and cartoons, along with professional sports teams like the Atlanta Braves.
Turner’s faith was somewhat shaken after his family moved to Savannah, Georgia, where his sister Mary Jean contracted a rare form of lupus at the age of 12. “She was sick for five years before she passed away. And it just seemed so unfair, because she hadn’t done anything wrong,” Turner said. “What had she done wrong? And I couldn’t get any answers. Christianity couldn’t give me any answers to that. So my faith got shaken somewhat.”
He was sent to several strict Southern military schools. His father had hopes of him getting accepted to Harvard, but Turner attended another Ivy League School-Brown University. However, his father was unhappy and cut off his tuition because he disapproved of his major.
Turner began his media career when he was 24 years old and took over his father’s billboard company, Turner Outdoor Advertising, in the wake of the latter’s suicide. He buried his shock and grief in work but Turner wasn’t content to push other people’s products forever.
He bought up radio stations, then branched into television in 1970 by acquiring a struggling station in Atlanta known as Channel 17. Turner also tried to boost the ratings by airing old sitcoms and classic films.
However, he wasn’t interested in the news yet. He decided to invest in sports instead and acquired the rights to Atlanta Braves baseball games. In 1976, he beamed Channel 17’s signal up to a satellite, and it became cable TV’s first superstation, reaching cable subscribers across the country.
Ted Turner, a jack of many trades
During his lifetime, Turned donned many hats. Internationally, he was known as a yachtsman. He was also a philanthropist who founded the United Nations Foundation and an activist who sought the worldwide elimination of nuclear weapons. Turner was also a conservationist who became one of the foremost landowners in the United States.
Additionally, he played a significant role in reintroducing bison to the American West. He also created the Captain Planet cartoon to educate kids about the environment.
Later, in the mid-1980s, Turner acquired MGM’s library of more than 4,000 old films and stoked a controversy in the film community for colorising many black-and-white movies, including “Casablanca.”
In 1991, he was named as Time magazine’s Man of the Year for “influencing the dynamic of events and turning viewers in 150 countries into instant witnesses of history.”
In 1996, he sold his networks to Time Warner for roughly $7.5 billion. He stayed on as a vice-chairman of Time Warner, heading up the company’s cable TV networks.
