Ted Turner, outspoken founder of CNN, dies at 87
The Life and Legacy of Ted Turner
By Bill Trott
Turner's Passing and Health
WASHINGTON, May 6 (Reuters) - Ted Turner, the brash sportsman and entrepreneur whose ambition and instincts led to a media empire that included groundbreaking news network CNN, has died, CNN reported on Wednesday citing a press release from Turner Enterprises. He was 87.
No cause of death was given.
In September 2018 Turner revealed that he had Lewy body dementia, a degenerative nerve disease.
Colorful Personality and Nicknames
One nickname was not enough for a personality as roguish and bold as Turner's. He was known variously as the "Mouth of the South," "Captain Outrageous," and "Terrible Ted."
Building a Media Empire
He became a billionaire by taking over his father's billboard business, buying a television station in 1970 and parlaying that into what would become a vast ground-breaking television group.
Turner became one of the most powerful figures in U.S. media and entertainment, his networks specializing in news, sports, re-runs, and old movies. But he did not stop there. He added the MGM/UA movie studio to his portfolio before making an even bigger move - merging his Turner Broadcasting System with Time Warner in 1996.
Turner headed the new company's cable networks division and was its leading shareholder, but he had trouble fitting into a corporate system after decades of free-wheeling as his own boss. He eventually lost control of his networks.
Philanthropy and Environmentalism
Turner also became one of the world's leading environmentalists, one of the largest land owners in the United States, and a major philanthropist, giving $1 billion to the United Nations.
Personal Life and Passions
With a slender mustache, gap-toothed grin, dimpled chin and mischievous glint in his eye, Turner pursued a range of passions. In the 1970s he owned the Atlanta Braves baseball team and the Atlanta Hawks of the National Basketball Association and skippered his yacht the Courageous to the America's Cup. The many women in his life included Oscar-winning actress Jane Fonda.
In 1986 he started the Goodwill Games, an Olympic-like competition, and two years later bought a wrestling organization that provided more TV content. His concerns about nuclear war led him to co-found the Nuclear Threat Initiative in 2001.
Forbes estimates Turner's fortune at $2.8 billion.
"If I only had a little humility, I'd be perfect," he once said.
Early Life and Career
Rocky Start in TV
ROCKY START IN TV
Robert Edward Turner III was born in Cincinnati on November 19, 1938, moving to the South with his family when he was 9. He was sent to military schools where he became a champion debater and yachtsman.
He enrolled at Brown University in Rhode Island and angered his father by studying the classics rather than business. Turner got in trouble for having a girlfriend in his room, among other offenses, and he never graduated.
He joined his family's advertising company in Savannah, Georgia, selling space on billboards. At 24 he was left in charge after his father killed himself.
The business was sold to pay debts but after a family debate in which Turner was victorious, he repurchased the firm and made it successful. In 1970, against the counsel of advisers, he bought a failing Atlanta UHF television station, now called WTBS, for $2.5 million.
After a rocky start, Turner eventually made the station profitable with low-cost 24-hour programming. The station's fortunes rose in 1976 after a federal ruling that cable television systems could use satellite signals for programming. By being a satellite pioneer, Turner helped WTBS become the first "superstation," with programming picked up by local cable systems across the country.
Founding of CNN
In 1980, he started CNN in Atlanta, which he said would counter "sleazy" coverage by the major networks CBS, NBC and ABC. Offering low pay but the lure of adventure, Turner signed up journalists and technical crew who endured ridicule that the "Chicken Noodle Network" would fail. Instead, as the first 24-hour news outlet, it set a template for worldwide news coverage of wars, trials, revolutions and manmade and natural disasters.
"Barring satellite problems, we won't be signing off until the world ends," Turner said in a 2013 CNN interview. In 2018, in the middle of President Donald Trump's stormy first term, Turner said in an interview that he rarely watched the network he had founded any more, saying that it focused too much on politics.
As a "televisionary," Turner was named Man of the Year in 1991 by Time magazine for "influencing the dynamic of events and turning viewers in 150 countries into instant witnesses of history."
Major Mergers and Business Changes
In 1996 Time Warner Inc bought his Turner Broadcasting System for $7.5 billion, creating the world's largest communications company, with properties such as HBO, Warner Bros movie studio, Time magazine, CNN, Cartoon Network and Turner Classic Movies.
In 2001, Time Warner merged with online provider AOL, a $99 billion deal that Turner voted in favor of. But in the ensuing reorganization, he was stripped of his position overseeing the cable networks that he had created and ultimately lost billions as the value of the company's stock fell. In 2003 he quit as vice chairman and three years later stepped down as a Time Warner director.
He battled depression and often spoke of suicide, according to his biographer.
Turner's Outspokenness
Blunt Talker
BLUNT TALKER
In his early days Turner had a reputation as a raucous drinker who bluntly spoke whatever was on his mind.
"I don't have any idea what I'm going to say," he once told the New Yorker magazine. "I say what comes to my mind."
He ticked off the Catholic church when he called some of his employees "Jesus freaks" because of the Ash Wednesday marks on their foreheads and told a group of Germans that after being on the wrong side of two world wars, they could turn things around just as his losing Braves baseball team had done.
Turner had a long-running feud with fellow med
