Remembering Ted Turner

Dies at 87, CNN founder reshaped TV

Ted Turner, who reshaped television and changed journalism with his groundbreaking launch of CNN, died Wednesday at the age of 87. Though a cause of death has yet to be determined, Turner suffered from Lew Body’s Disease, the same kind of ailment Casey Kasem was diagnosed with as he passed away in June 2014.

Turner began his media empire by inheriting his late father’s billboard business. He expanded into TV in 1970 by buying three-year-old Atlanta UHF independent WJRJ-TV, which he renamed WTCG. In 1976, Turner put WTCG on satellite, expanding its reach beyond the Atlanta market and became the first “superstation”, making it available to cable viewers nationwide with Andy Griffith and Gilligan’s Island reruns as staples. WTCG became WTBS (for Turner Broadcasting System) in 1979, before becoming WPCH-TV in 2007 when its local broadcast and national cable channel seperated. During the 1980s, TBS developed award-winning original programming such as National Geographic Explorer and Portrait Of America. And from 1981 to 1997, began programs at :05 and :35 past the hour, being dubbed as “Turner Time” to stand out in program listings.

Turner also owned a struggling Charlotte UHF station, which is the current-day NBC affiliate WCNC-TV. In 1972, he came on the air to appeal to viewers for donations to save the station, but was reprimanded by the FCC, so he never tried it again. He sold it to Group W in 1979, a year after it successfully won the NBC affiliation after WSOC-TV dropped it for ABC, a trend that was common in the industry at the time given NBC’s third-place status.

Turner became an early pioneer in cable TV, launching Cable News Network in 1980 using the funds he acquired from the sale of his Charlotte station, becoming the first 24-hour all-news network at a time people scoffed at the idea. CNN won respect for its Persian Gulf War coverage in 1991, which critics lauded. 

He also made his mark in sports, purchasing the Atlanta Braves and putting them on WTCG, even managing the team for a game in 1977. The Braves gained a nationwide fan base – especially in the Southeast – thanks to being on the Superstation, which also aired the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks (which he also owned) and the NHL’s Atlanta Flames. Turner also aired plenty of wrestling, starting in 1971. In 1988, he bought National Wrestling Alliance  (which would later become World Championship Wrestling) to complete directly with the World Wrestling Federation. Turner became a World Series champion in 1995 when the Braves beat the Cleveland Indians to win the title for the first time since moving to Atlanta.

TBS also became the home of the NBA in 1984, exposing cable TV viewers to young stars like Michael Jordan. Charles Barkley, and Patrick Ewing. It would begin a relationship that would last 41 years. 

Turner also gambled by making some big business deals to launch new cable networks. Even though he failed to purchase CBS in a hostile takeover, he was able to buy MGM/UA for $1.5 billion in 1986 from Kirk Kerkorian using their vast film library to launch Turner Classic Movies in April 1994, showcasing classic cinema (although later in 1986, he would sell the studio and a few TV shows – but not the film library – back to Kerkorian, including the MGM name), and bought the Hanna-Barbera library in 1991 from Great American Broadcasting (formerly Taft) to launch Cartoon Network a year later.

In October 1988, he used the classic film Gone With The Wind to launch Turner Network Television (TNT), which began airing NFL games in 1990, becoming the second cable network to do so. 

Turner also launched a syndication unit in 1982, initially selling WTBS programming into syndication such as video-game show Starcade, and evolved into selling original programming including environmentally-concious animated series Captain Planet, Lauren Hutton’s talk show, off-network sitcom The Wonder Years, and several movie packages, including the return of Gone With The Wind to broadcast television in November 1990. 

As a philanthropist, Turner gave billions to charity, including to the United Nations and several environmental organizations. But he also had a brash personality, as some dubbed him as the “Mouth Of The South” given his Georgia roots, and his disdain for Vince McMahon and Rupert Murdoch were well-known. He was also criticized by the film community for colorizing classic black-and-white films, as longtime film critics Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert were not fans. Turner was even parodied for his efforts on the Fox comedy In Living Color in the sketch Ted Turner’s Colorization Theater.

In 1996, Turner sold his entire portfolio to TimeWarner, in a sale he would later regret, and joined the company’s board. A few years after AOL merged with TimeWarner, Turner left the company, and left the media business behind. 

Turner proved by being in Atlanta, he can be a media mogul without basing himself in the traditional entertainment capitals of New York City or Hollywood. Turner’s influence helped raise Atlanta’s and Georgia’s status as a production hub, with many film and TV projects being produced in the area (thanks to generous tax credits) including until recently, Marvel’s Avengers franchise. Today’s media executives are known as selfish and authoritarian oafs who try to please a certain person in the White House, but Ted Turner was a person who wasn’t persuaded by politicans and built his empire the way he wanted to. He was an original, and one who’ll never be forgotten and sadly, never see the likes of again.