Giants of Broadcasting& Electronic Arts
Sets Honorees for 2014
First announcement includes Pablo Raúl Alarcón Sr., Raúl Alarcón Jr.,
David Barrett, Chuck Scarborough, Fred Silverman, Peter Smyth,
Judy Woodruff and Gwen Ifill and Sylvester L. “Pat” Weaver
The 12th annual staging of the Giants of Broadcasting & Electronic Arts, a yearly event sponsored by the Library of American Broadcasting and celebrating distinguished leadership or performance in television and radio, is scheduled forThursday, October 16th, in New York’s Gotham Hall. The Library has announced the starting lineup of professionals who will be recognized in 2014 for their contributions to those media in the last half-century. The distinguished honorees join 170 Giants of Broadcasting & Electronic Arts previously celebrated by the Library.
The Honorees
Pablo Raúl Alarcón, Sr. was founder and chairman of the board of directors of Spanish Broadcasting System from March 1983 until November, 1999, when he became Chairman Emeritus. Alarcón Sr. was involved in Spanish-language radio broadcasting since the early 1950s when he established his first radio station in Camagüey, Cuba. Alarcón Sr. had acquired 14 radio stations by the time he fled Cuba with his family to the United States in 1960. Once here, he continued his career as an on-air personality at a New York radio station before being promoted to programming director. He subsequently owned a recording studio and advertising agency before purchasing the first SBS radio station, WSKQ-AM, in 1983 with his son, Raúl Alarcón Jr. Pablo served as chairman of the SBS board of directors, while his son Raúl initially served as an account executive in the sales department. Pablo Raúl Alarcón Sr. died in Miami on June 11, 2008.
Raúl Alarcón, Jr. is the current CEO and president of SBS, positions he has held since June 1994 and October 1995, respectively. The company now owns and operates some 20 radio stations in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, San Francisco and Puerto Rico, as well as seven television stations. He succeeded his father as chairman of the board of directors in 1999 and is responsible for the company’s long-range strategic planning and operational matters and acquisitions. SBS generated sales of about $20 million in its first year, confirming the influence of the growing Spanish-speaking audience. In 1998 SBS purchased its first FM station, KLAX-FM in Los Angeles. The company went public in the fall of 199l, raising $435.8 million by selling 21.8 million shares at $20 per share. SBS bought its third station, New York’s WSKQ-FM, in 1989 and reformatted it as Mega 97.9. The station surpassed the market’s longtime leader, the light rock station WLTW-FM, in 1998. In 2002 the company created SBS Entertainment, a concert production arm, purchased 80 percent of JuJu Media, the operator of the Spanish-English Web site LaMusica.com, and launched KZAB-FM, targeting the Central American population in Los Angeles. In 2003, WSKQ, SBS’s first station, was the most listened-to Spanish-language radio station in the United States.
David J. Barrett is the recently retired chief executive officer and chairman of Hearst Television at The Hearst Corporation. Barrett was named president and CEO of Hearst-Argyle Television in 2001, then a publicly traded subsidiary of Hearst Corp. He helped take the company private in 2009 when it was renamed Hearst Television. Barrett served as co-CEO of Hearst-Argyle Television from June 1999 to December 31, 2000, becoming CEO in 2001. He served as president from June 1999 to December 2012, when he was promoted to chairman. Hearst-Argyle was publicly traded on the NYSE from 1998 until 2009, when it was taken private by Hearst Corporation and re-named Hearst Television. He had a six-year tenure as deputy general manager of Hearst Broadcasting and four years as executive vice president and chief operating officer of Hearst-Argyle Television. Barrett joined Hearst in 1984 as general manager of the company’s Baltimore radio stations, later assuming general manager responsibility for the Hearst Radio Group and then for WBAL-TV in Baltimore, where he presided over the revitalization of Hearst’s original TV station. Barrett was given additional responsibility for the Hearst radio group in 1985 and, in 1989, assumed general corporate responsibilities for the Hearst Broadcasting Group. He remains a director of Hearst Corporation and is a trustee established under the will of William Randolph Hearst and a director of the Hearst Foundations. His industry leadership includes many years of influential service on the Television Board of the National Association of Broadcasters, and he remains active with the National Association of Broadcasters Education Foundation. He is a director of the Association for Maximum Service Television and the Broadcasters Foundation of America.
CHUCK SCARBOROUGH is arguably the senior major market anchorman in local television, by virtue of his 40 years as co-anchor of News 4 New York at 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. at WNBC-TV New York. The Emmy Award-winning veteran broadcast journalist joined that station in 1974 after service beginning at WDAM-TV in Hattiesburg, Miss., in 1968 and continuing through WLOX-TV Biloxi, Miss., WAGA-TV Atlanta and WNAC-TV Boston. He celebrated his 40th anniversary with NBC 4 New York in March this year. In addition to anchoring and covering domestic issues, Scarborough has delivered high-profile reports on a variety of topics across the globe, reporting from Europe, Russia, the Middle East, the Philippines, Mexico and South America and has hosted special news programs for NBC 4. Scarborough served four years in the U.S. Air Force before beginning his television career. Among his numerous honors are 33 Emmy awards for virtually every category of broadcast journalism. Scarborough is also an accomplished writer and has authored three novels, Stryker (1978), The Myrmidon Project (1980), and Aftershock (1991).
Fred Silverman grew up in the television business. After starting out in the mailroom of ABC-TV in the late 1950s, he rose to director of program development at WGN-TV Chicago in the early ’60s. One day, he abandoned his car during a snowstorm and boarded a plane for New York, where he gained a position as head of Daytime Programming at CBS-TV. In 1970, he became the programming head of CBS, where he programmed such hits as The Mary Tyler Moore Show, All in the Family, M*A*S*H and The Jeffersons. Additionally, Silverman reintroduced game shows to the network’s daytime lineups in 1972 after a four-year absence. Under Silverman’s tenure, CBS also ended the practice of wiping and reusing videotapes and saved as much of their recorded content as possible, while other networks recycled tapes constantly to save money. In 1975, he left for ABC as head of its entertainment division, where he developed such new hits as Laverne & Shirley, The Love Boat, Donny and Marie and Soap. By the end of the 1977-78 season, ABC was number one in both daytime and nighttime. In 1978, Silverman left ABC and joined NBC as president and CEO. His presence helped stem the audience erosion of the prior five years with new programs such as Diff’rent Strokes, Real People and Hill Street Blues. After departing NBC in June of 1981, Silverman formed The Fred Silverman Company and became an independent producer. Among his successes were Matlock, In the Heat of the Night, Jake and the Fatman and Diagnosis Murder. Silverman remains in the independent production business and also does program consulting across the spectrum of electronic media.
Peter Smyth is the chairman and chief executive officer of Greater Media, Inc., one of the nation’s leading broadcasting companies. In this role, Smyth oversees the operational efforts of 21 AM and FM radio stations in Boston, Charlotte, Detroit, Philadelphia and New Jersey; a group of weekly newspapers in central New Jersey; and several telecommunications towers throughout the United States. Over the past three decades, Smyth has served in a variety of capacities within Greater Media, including general manager of WMJX-FM in Boston, vice president of the Radio Group, and chief operating officer of Greater Media, Inc. Smyth began his career in broadcasting in 1977 as an account executive with WROR-FM in Boston. He was quickly promoted to general sales manager, a position he held for the next five years. In 1983, RKO General, the parent company of WOR, recruited him to serve as general sales manager of its New York stations, where he directed the company’s sales operations until his departure in 1986 to work at Greater Media. A visionary in his field, Smyth has helped to revolutionize the broadcasting industry by advocating for and adopting new technologies such as HD Radio and internet streaming, and by developing and incorporating innovative content to improve media communications and meet the emerging demands of the industry and its advertisers.
JUDY WOODRUFF AND GWEN IFILL are the co-anchors and managing editors of PBS NewsHour with Gwen Ifill and Judy Woodruff; Ifill is also the moderator and managing editor of Washington Week, the longest-running prime-time news and public affairs program on television. Woodruff has covered politics and other news as a broadcast journalist for more than three decades. She was White House correspondent for NBC from 1977 to 1982. At PBS from 1983 to 1993, she was the chief Washington correspondent for The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour, and she also anchored PBS’ award-winning weekly documentary series Frontline with Judy Woodruff from 1984 to 1990. For 12 years starting in 1993, she served as anchor and senior correspondent for CNN, where her duties included anchoring the weekday program Inside Politics. After taking off a year from broadcasting to teach at Harvard and her alma mater Duke University, she returned to PBS and joined The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer as senior correspondent and substitute anchor. Ifill joined both Washington Week and PBS NewsHour in 1999, interviewing newsmakers and reporting on issues ranging from foreign affairs to politics. Before coming to PBS, she was chief congressional and political correspondent for NBC News, White House correspondent for The New York Times, and a local and national political reporter for The Washington Post. She also reported for the Baltimore Evening Sun and the Boston Herald American. The best-selling author of The Breakthrough: Politics and Race in the Age of Obama (2009), she moderated the Vice Presidential debates during the Presidential elections in 2004 and 2008.
Sylvester L. “Pat” Weaver is widely considered to be one of television’s greatest innovators. His career distinguished that medium in its earliest days and his influence continues today. Weaver originally worked for the Young & Rubicam advertising agency during the golden age of radio, eventually supervising all the agency’s radio programming. NBC hired him in 1949 to develop a new television network. At NBC, Weaver established many operating practices that became standards. He introduced the practice of networks producing their own television programming instead of having the ad agencies do it, breaking the dependence of programs on sole corporate sponsors. He became president of NBC between 1953 and 1955. He has been credited with reshaping commercial broadcasting’s format and philosophy as radio gave way to television as America’s dominant home entertainment. Weaver created Today in 1952, followed by Tonight Starring Steve Allen, Home with Arlene Francis and Wide Wide World, hosted by Dave Garroway. He didn’t ignore NBC Radio, either. In 1955, as network radio was dying, Weaver gave it one of the greatest adrenaline kicks in its history with NBC Monitor, a weekend-long magazine-style programming block that featured an array of news, music, comedy, drama, sports, and anything that could be broadcast within magazine style, with rotating advertisers and some of the most memorable names in broadcast journalism, entertainment and sports. Weaver left NBC in 1956 over disputes with RCA founder David Sarnoff. Weaver’s last major effort at television innovation came in the early 1960s when he headed Subscription Television, Inc., an early venture into the pay cable industry. Although it failed, his efforts helped remove certain barriers to the eventual development of cable television. He died in 2002.
Award-winning actress Sigourney Weaver, his daughter, will be accepting the Giants honor for her father. Ms. Weaver is an American actress known especially for the lead role of Ellen Ripley in the four “Alien” films: Alien, Aliens, Alien 3, and Alien Resurrection. She is also well known for her role as Dana Barrett in Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II, and for Gorillas in the Mist, Working Girl, and Avatar. She recently starred in USA Network’s political miniseries Political Animals.
The Library of American Broadcasting(LAB) — located at the University of Maryland — is entering its 42nd year serving as the national information resource for the radio and television industries and the academic communities that rely upon it for depth and expertise. Its collections of historic documents, professional papers, oral and video histories, books and photographs are among the nation’s most extensive. LAB is evolving from a conventional library into a “homepage” for the world at large, no longer confined to responding to constituents one at a time but reaching thousands simultaneously through the Internet. Industry outreach includes lectures, symposia, print and the broadcast media themselves.
LAB’s chair is Virginia Hubbard Morris, president of Hubbard Radio, based in Minneapolis-St. Paul; the Giants event chair is Donald West, veteran broadcast journalist; the dean of libraries at the University of Maryland is Patricia Steele, and the curator is Chuck Howell. The Library has been honoring leaders in the broadcasting industry annually since 2003 — its list of Giants now totals 170. Previous honorees include industry founders Guglielmo Marconi, David Sarnoff of RCA and NBC, William S. Paley and Frank Stanton of CBS, Leonard Goldenson of ABC, Bob Hope, Lucille Ball, Jack Benny, Philo T. Farnsworth, H. V. Kaltenborn, Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite, Arthur Godfrey, Paul Harvey, Charlie Rose, Ken Burns, Johnny Carson, Katie Couric, Brian Williams, Christiane Amanpour, Lowry Mays and Tim Russert.
Library of american broadcasting foundation
BOX 2749 ALEXANDRIA VA 22301 TEL 703 548 6090 WEST[email protected]
TICKETS: Reservations for tables and individual tickets to the event may be arranged through Jessica Wolin at 212-685-4233 or by e–mail at [email protected].
PRESS: Ellyn Fisher, 212-984-1964, [email protected]
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Awards go to Anne Sweeney, Alex Trebek, Barry Diller, Morley Safer, Dick Cavett, Jeff Smulyan, Robert L. Johnson, David E. Kelley, Richard E. Wiley, Richard Leibner and Carole Cooper
The 11th annual staging of the GIANTS OF BROADCASTING, a yearly event sponsored by the Library of American Broadcasting and celebrating distinguished leadership or performance in television and radio, is scheduled for OCTOBER 16 in New York’s Gotham Hall. Eleven distinguished professionals will be recognized in 2013 for excellence in the electronic communication arts, joining 159 previously honored by the Library since 2003.
The Honorees:
ANNE SWEENEY is co-chair of Disney Media Networks and president of the Disney/ABC Television Group, which includes The Walt Disney Company’s global entertainment and news television properties, its owned television stations group and radio businesses. Curiosity, creativity and a single-minded focus on what consumers want have guided Sweeney’s groundbreaking career in television. Overseeing properties including the ABC Television Network, Disney Channels Worldwide, ABC Family and ABC Studios, in 2005 she led the industry into the digital era when the Disney/ABC Television Group became the first media company to put television content on new platforms. The group was the first to leverage iTunes, the first to introduce an ad-supported full episode player online, and the first to deliver an application for the revolutionary iPad. Under Sweeney’s leadership, the Group continues to combine high-quality content with strategic use of traditional and emerging distribution platforms to deliver compelling news and entertainment viewing experiences to hundreds of millions of people around the world. Most recently, through its WATCH ABC service, ABC became the first major network to provide authenticated viewers with live access to their favorite ABC shows and local market programming, as well as a variety of on-demand content, in more ways than ever before, at home and on the go. Additionally, during Sweeney’s tenure she oversaw the successful launch of the 24-hour channel Toon Disney (now Disney XD) and later the launch of Disney Junior. Sweeney joined The Walt Disney Company in 1996. Previously she was chairman and CEO of FX Networks Inc., where she presided over the launch of FX and FXM: Movies from Fox, Hollywood’s first studio-based movie network. Before joining Fox, Sweeney spent 12 years at Nickelodeon/Nick at Nite, latterly as senior vice president of Program Enterprises. She has been named one of “The 50 Most Powerful Women in Business” by Fortune, one of “The World’s 100 Most Powerful Women” by Forbes and the “Most Powerful Woman in Entertainment” by The Hollywood Reporter.
ALEX TREBEK, one of television’s most iconic figures, has entertained millions of viewers worldwide during the last three decades of Jeopardy! Trebek has hosted more than 6,000 episodes since the show’s latest incarnation made its syndicated debut in 1984. Jeopardy! won its 30th Emmy last year. Trebek himself has won five Daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Game Show Host and in 2011 received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. Trebek started his broadcasting career in 1961 as a reporter for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), Canada’s premier network, where he covered national news and special events for radio and television. Five years later he was offered the quizmaster position on a game show for Canadian high school kids, Reach for the Top, and hosted several other Canadian game shows at the same time. He left Canada in 1973 and came to America to host NBC’s The Wizard of Odds. After joining Merv Griffin’s Jeopardy!, Trebek was a hit with viewers and quickly became a pop culture icon. A long-time USO supporter, he has participated in 12 USO tours greeting America’s men and women in uniform. He has been honored with a coveted star on both the Hollywood Walk of Fame and the Canadian Walk of Fame in Toronto, making him one of only a handful of people so honored by both countries.
BARRY DILLER is themedia titan responsible for the creation of Fox Broadcasting Company and USA Broadcasting, and former CEO of Paramount Pictures, who is currently the Chairman of and Senior Executive of IAC, a leading media and Internet conglomerate, and of Expedia. His life could be the stuff of a Hollywood script. Self-made in the media, he started at the bottom of the social scale working in the mailroom of the William Morris Agency, before joining ABC as a television executive, where he created the ABC Movie of the Week, pioneering the concept of the made-for television movie through a series of 90-minute films produced exclusively for television. At 31 he became president of Paramount Studios, turning the company around by reducing budgets and launching shows including Taxi and Cheers and feature films such as Saturday Night Fever and Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. When Rupert Murdoch bought Twentieth Century Fox Corporation and asked Diller to help him launch the broadcasting division, few thought a fourth network was possible, but Diller proved them wrong. After the launch of FOX he decided it was time to have his own business. He amassed a media empire, including multiple cable channels and Internet companies. Diller purchased a stake in the home-shopping channel QVC and later took control of USA Interactive. In 1996, he became the head of Silver King Communications, renamed IAC, and since then has led the company to a series of acquisitions in Internet companies, including Ticketmaster, Expedia, Citysearch, Match.com and the search engine Ask.com. In 2005 IAC spun off Expedia to make it a separate, publicly traded company. In 2008, Diller’s IAC spun off their other major assets including Ticketmaster, HSN, Tree.com and Interval Leisure Group. Diller is currently the backer of Aereo, a technology startup that allows users to access over the air television across all Internet connected devices and platforms, a move challenged by many broadcasters.
Few have ever been able to tell a story as well as MORLEY SAFER, theaward-winning 60 Minutes correspondent on CBS and pioneering war reporter. Safer’s witty and superbly written features have been a mainstay for over four decades on that TV stalwart. His primetime achievements rest on a foundation of groundbreaking war reporting that began in Africa and the Middle East for the CBC and continued at CBS News in the 1960s with coverage in Southeast Asia. Safer’s legendary CBS Evening News reports from Vietnam battlefields changed war reporting forever; his 1965 story showing G.I.s burning the homes of villagers in Cam Ne was named one of the top 100 news reports of the century. The report prompted the U.S. military to issue new rules of engagement. In 1965 Safer opened the Saigon Bureau for CBS News and he later served as the network’s London Bureau chief. In 2011 Safer landed one of the biggest interviews for CBS: 18.5 million people watched him ask Ruth Madoff what she knew about her husband Bernard’s Ponzi scheme. Safer’s investigative report on Lenell Geter, an engineer wrongly convicted of armed robbery and sentenced to a life term in Texas, also received national attention and prestigious broadcast journalism awards. Safer has won 12 Emmy Awards, three Overseas Press Club Awards, three Peabody Awards and two Alfred I. DuPont–Columbia University Awards. He has also written a best-selling book, Flashbacks: On Returning to Vietnam (1990), which describes his 1989 return to Vietnam.
DICK CAVETT, Emmy-winning talk show legend, comedian and writer, has hosted and interviewed a wide range of guests, from authors and political figures to musicians and singers. Over the course of his career, and on The Dick Cavett Show particularly, Cavett has enjoyed pairing controversial people with opposing views to discuss often taboo subject matter. Cavett has won three Emmy Awards for his work. He began his career as a copyboy at Time magazine, then was hired as a comedy writer for The Tonight Show after he slipped an envelope of jokes into Jack Paar’s hands in an RCA Building hallway. Cavett also wrote for shows including The Jerry Lewis Show, and later did stand-up on The Tonight Show, The Merv Griffin Show and The Ed Sullivan Show. This success led to ABC giving Cavett the job hosting This Morning in 1968 and then his own late-night program, The Dick Cavett Show, a year later. Cavett is probably best known for this first incarnation of the several talk shows that have borne his name and aired on various networks from 1969 to 2007. The show was often referred to as “the thinking man’s talk show” and Cavett was considered a solid and thoughtful interviewer.Guests included Jimi Hendrix, Bobby Fischer, Groucho Marx, Orson Welles, Gore Vidal, Marlon Brando and Muhammad Ali. John Lennon and Yoko gave Cavett their first interview after the break-up of the Beatles in September 1971, and in 1973 Katherine Hepburn gave Cavett her first-ever television interview. Since the show, Cavett has appeared many times as a stand-up comedian on a variety of talk shows, in commercials and occasionally in theater, such as Broadway’s Otherwise Engaged and Into the Woods. He is currently a contributing blogger for The New York Times.
Radio veteran JEFF SMULYAN is the founder, CEO and president of Emmis Communications, an Indianapolis-based radio, TV and magazine publishing company. After operating two radio stations – WNTS in Indianapolis and KCRO in Omaha – Smulyan formed and became principal shareholder of Emmis in 1980. The company currently owns and operates 20 FM and 2 AM radio stations in the nation’s largest markets and six local, regional and national magazine operations. In 1995, Emmis became the first company to own top-rated stations in New York and Los Angeles simultaneously. A former director of the National Association of Broadcasters and former chairman of the Board of Directors of the Radio Advertising Bureau, Smulyan served as past chair of the Central Indiana Corporate Partnership, a consortium of CEOs from central Indiana’s largest corporations. He is a member of numerous civic boards and committees. As principal shareholder, Smulyan led a group that purchased the Seattle Mariners baseball team in 1989, selling the club three years later. In 2000, Smulyan was honored with the National Association of Broadcasters’ National Radio Award and as Radio Ink’s “Radio Executive of the Year.” He has also been named one of the 10 most influential radio executives of the past two decades. In recent years, Smulyan has been leading the radio industry’s groundbreaking efforts to expand FM radio’s reach to mobile phones.
ROBERT L. JOHNSON, businessman, media mogul, investor and billionaire, is perhaps most well-known for being the founder of Black Entertainment Television (BET), the first cable network designed to reach African Americans. The network, which provides music, news, sports and public affairs programming, launched modestly in 1980 and has been widely credited with bringing diversity to mainstream media to a degree never before seen. Upon Johnson’s taking the company public in 1991, it became the first African American-owned business to be publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange. The network, later sold to Viacom, has continued to grow to reach tens of millions of homes and expand to include other traditional and digital channels. Johnson remained the CEO through 2005. After stepping down, he dedicated himself to several other business and philanthropic pursuits. Johnson is the founder and chairman of The RLJ Companies, a business network providing strategic investments in a diverse portfolio of companies in the financial services, real estate, hospitality, film production, automotive and gaming industries. Johnson became the first minority owner of a professional sports franchise, the Charlotte Bobcats, and later sold the majority stake to NBA Hall of Famer Michael Jordan. In 2006, Johnson founded Our Stories Films with partner Harvey Weinstein. The company focuses on family-friendly movies intended for African-American audiences, including the 2011 comedy feature Jumping the Broom. Johnson’s RLJ Companies has also introduced two paid channels on YouTube as part of a pilot program on the popular video-sharing site. The first channel, OnCue, offers movies, documentaries and other programming targeted to African American and urban audiences, and the second, Acorn TV, specializes in British drama and mysteries.
DAVID E. KELLEY, prolific and award-winning television writer and producer, is recognized as one of the finest in the business. He is the creator of hit shows including Picket Fences, Chicago Hope, The Practice, Ally McBeal, Boston Public, Boston Legal and Harry’s Law, as well as several films. Kelley is one of very few screenwriters to have had shows run on all four of the top commercial U.S. television networks (ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC).The former Boston-based attorney is famous for writing most of his scripts on a yellow legal pad. He wrote his first screenplay, the courtroom comedy From the Hip (which later became a 1986 film), while practicing real estate and criminal law. The screenplay was shared with Steven Bochco, a television producer who was looking for legal-minded writers to work on his new drama series, L.A. Law. The young lawyer started as a story editor and writer of the show and later became executive producer. Kelley left in 1992 to start his own series, Picket Fences. By 1999 he had emerged as a leader in primetime television, involved in no fewer than five series. During the 1999-2000 season, Kelley accomplished the singular feat of winning Emmys for both Outstanding Drama Series and Outstanding Comedy Series for The Practice and Ally McBeal, both focused on law firms in Boston. As a writer and producer, Kelley has amassed a total of 10 individual Emmys and has been responsible for 30 different actors and actresses winning their own Emmy Awards across many competitive categories.
RICHARD E. WILEY, former Chairman, Commissioner and General Counsel of the Federal Communications Commission, was a leading force in the effort to foster increased competition and lessened regulation in the communications field during his tenure at the FCC in the 1970s. He also played a pivotal role in the development of HDTV, serving for nine years as Chairman of the FCC’s Advisory Committee on Advanced Television Service. Wiley has been called the “Father of High-Definition Television” (Globe and Mail), as well as the “Most Influential Media and Telecommunications Lawyer in the U.S.” (International Herald Tribune), and one of the top “100 Men of the Century” (Broadcasting & Cable). Wiley has received an Emmy Award, the Electronic Industries’ Medal of Honor, the Distinguished Service Award from the National Association of Broadcasters and the North American Broadcasters Association’s International Achievement Award. He is currently senior partner in the Washington, D.C. law firm Wiley Rein, where he heads the firm’s Communications Practice, the largest in the nation, representing communications organizations including Verizon, AT&T, JP Morgan, Credit Suisse, Newspaper Association of America, Motorola, CBS, Belo, Gannett, Sirius/XM, Emmis and LG Electronics. Wiley is a frequent author and lecturer on telecommunications and information law.
RICHARD LEIBNER, founder and president of N.S. Bienstock Inc., is one of America’s most successful and powerful talent agents in broadcast journalism. Leibner has pioneered representation of televison news talent, driving up the market for broadcasters over the past forty years. He has represented such icons as Eric Sevareid, Dan Rather, Mike Wallace, Ed Bradley, Maria Shriver, Paula Zahn, Chris Mathews, Andy Rooney, Diane Sawyer, Bob Schieffer, Steve Kroft and Morley Safer. Leibner’s success stems from his representation style and the salaries he commands for his clients. According to The New York Times Magazine, “Leibner with a phone is like Mantle with a bat.” In 1963, Leibner went to work for his family’s accounting firm. The serendipitous meeting of his father Sol and insurance salesman Nate Bienstock, both having author John Steinbeck as a client, brought the three men together. One year later they co-founded N.S. Bienstock Inc. and he began his career as a talent agent to the up-and- coming stars in local and national broadcast news. Leibner has been profiled in numerous publications including The New York Times, Broadcasting & Cable, New York Magazine, People, Electronic Media, Television Week, US Magazine, Worth, Forbes, O-The Oprah Magazine and the New York Observer. In 2004, he was honored by his alma mater, The University of Rochester, with the Meliora Citation for Career Achievement – the university’s most prestigious alumni award for professional excellence.
CAROLE COOPER, an agent for thirty-five years and Leibner’s wife and partner, is recognized as one of the most experienced and respected talent agents in the business. Cooper started out representing local news reporters and today has a client list of national news stars including Bill O’Reilly, Anderson Cooper, Lara Logan and Megyn Kelly. Many of them have been clients since their early careers in local television. Cooper has developed relationships with the industry’s most powerful executives and creative forces. From local and network news to programming, syndication and new media, she has access to a wide range of decision-makers. Cooper has helped local talent reach their goals of network television and has helped news talent make the transition into syndicated television including the likes of Harvey Levin, Linda Bell Blue and Judge Marilyn Milian. In 2001 Cooper was lauded for brokering the deal that made Aaron Brown the “new defining face” of CNN. Cooper and Leibner, along with sons Adam and Jonathan, have been listed among the “29 Big Apple “power families” profiled by the New York Observer. Electronic Media has called Cooper Bienstock’s “secret weapon” and in its issue featuring “The 10 Most Powerful People in TV News” as the agent who negotiated “the most intriguing news contracts written in the last year.” For 10 years, N.S. Bienstock Inc. has been the only agency reported on this list. Carole was also named to The Hollywood Reporter’s Women in Entertainment 2012: Power 100 list, THR’s annual ranking of the most powerful female leaders in the entertainment industry.
The Library of American Broadcasting (LAB) — located at the University of Maryland — is entering its 42nd year serving as the national information resource for the radio and television industries and the academic communities that rely upon it for depth and expertise. Its collections of historic documents, professional papers, oral and video histories, books and photographs are among the nation’s most extensive. LAB is evolving from a conventional library into a “homepage” for the world at large, no longer confined to responding to constituents one at a time but reaching thousands simultaneously through the Internet. Industry outreach includes lectures, symposia, print and the broadcast media themselves. LAB’s chair is Virginia Hubbard Morris, president of Hubbard Radio, based in Minneapolis- St. Paul; the president/CEO is Donald West, veteran broadcast journalist and former assistant to the president of CBS Inc. (serving as chief aide to the legendary Frank Stanton); the dean of libraries at the University of Maryland is Patricia Steele, and the curator is Chuck Howell.
Library of American Broadcasting Foundation: 703-548-6090, [email protected]
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The Library has been honoring leaders in the broadcasting industry annually since 2003 —its list of Giants will total 170 after this year’s inductions. Previous honorees include industry founders Guglielmo Marconi, David Sarnoff of RCA and NBC, William S. Paley and Frank Stanton of CBS, Leonard Goldenson of ABC, Bob Hope, Lucille Ball, Jack Benny, Philo Farnsworth, H. V. Kaltenborn, Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite, Arthur Godfrey, Paul Harvey, Charlie Rose, Ken Burns, Johnny Carson, Katie Couric, Brian Williams, Christiane Amanpour, Lowry Mays and Tim Russert, among a roll of honor that is available upon request.
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10 for 10th: Library of American Broadcasting
To Present Giants of Broadcasting Honors
Awards go to Sir Howard Stringer, Ted Turner, Norman Lear, George Beasley, Erica Farber, Robert MacNeil & Jim Lehrer, Andy Rooney, Don Cornelius and Dinah Shore
The national Library of American Broadcasting will present its 10th Annual GIANTS OF BROADCASTING Honors at a ceremony and luncheon to be held on October 18, 2012, in New York City. The event, attended by prominent members of the broadcasting, media and corporate communities, serves as a tribute to those individuals who have played pivotal roles in creating and advancing the electronic arts. The distinguished honorees join 140 Giants of Broadcasting who have been honored by the Library since 2003. BILL BAKER, president emeritus of WNET New York and himself a Giant of Broadcasting, will serve as master of ceremonies.
HONOREES: Sir Howard Stringer, Chairman of the Sony Corporation
Ted Turner, Media Mogul and Creator of CNN, TBS, TNT; Philanthropist
Norman Lear, Writer-Producer of All in the Family, Maude, The Jeffersons, Sanford and Son and a number of major hits
George Beasley, Chairman, CEO and Founder of Beasley Broadcast Group
Erica Farber, President and CEO of the Radio Advertising Bureau
Robert MacNeil and Jim Lehrer, Creators and Anchors of The MacNeil/Lehr Report, MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour, NewsHour with Jim Lehrer and PBS NewsHour
Andy Rooney* Veteran reporter; writer; commentator on CBS’ 60 Minutes
Don Cornelius**, Creator, Host and Producer of nationally syndicated Soul Train
Dinah Shore***, Singer, Actress and Television Personality
*Leslie Stahl, Correspondent, 60 Minutes and Face the Nation, will accept the award on behalf of Andy Rooney.
**Tony Cornelius will be accepting for his father, Don Cornelius.
***Dick Arlett, producer of “Dinah and Friends,” will accept for Dinah Shore.
WHEN: Thursday, October 18
11:30 a.m. (Reception)
Noon – 2:30 p.m. (Luncheon and Awards Ceremony)
WHERE: The Starlight Roof (18th Floor)
Waldorf-Astoria Hotel
301 Park Avenue (Between 49th and 50th Streets)
New York City
TICKETS: Reservations for tables and individual tickets to the event may be arranged through Jessica Wolin at 212-685-4233 or by e-mail through [email protected].
PRESS: All members of the press can RSVP by contacting Ellyn Fisher at 212-984-1964 or [email protected]
Library of American Broadcasting
The Library of American Broadcasting (LAB) — located at the University of Maryland — is entering its 41st year serving as the national information resource for the radio and television industries and the academic communities that rely upon it for depth and expertise. Its collections of historic documents, professional papers, oral and video histories, books and photographs are among the nation’s most extensive. LAB is evolving from a conventional library into a “homepage” for the world at large, no longer confined to responding to constituents one at a time but reaching thousands simultaneously through the Internet. Industry outreach includes lectures, symposia, print and the broadcast media themselves.
LAB’s chair is Virginia Hubbard Morris, president of Hubbard Radio, based in Minneapolis-St. Paul; the president/CEO is Donald West, veteran broadcast journalist and former assistant to the president of CBS Inc.; the dean of libraries at the University of Maryland is Patricia Steele, and the curator is Chuck Howell.
The Library has been honoring leaders in the broadcasting industry annually since 2003 — its list of Giants will now reach 150. Previous honorees include industry founders Guglielmo Marconi, David Sarnoff of RCA and NBC, William S. Paley and Frank Stanton of CBS, Leonard Goldenson of ABC, Bob Hope, Lucille Ball, Jack Benny, Philo Farnsworth, H. V. Kaltenborn, Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite, Arthur Godfrey, Paul Harvey, Charlie Rose, Ken Burns, Johnny Carson, Katie Couric, Brian Williams, Christiane Amanpour, Lowry Mays and Tim Russert.
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The Eighth Annual GIANTS OF BROADCASTING Awards Ceremony and Luncheon will take place in New York’s Grand Hyatt Hotel on OCTOBER 6, 2010, sponsored by the national LIBRARY OF AMERICAN BROADCASTING, which has among its life missions defining and honoring those individuals who played pivotal roles in creating and advancing the electronic arts. CHARLES OSGOOD of CBS Sunday Morning and CBS Radio will continue in his role as Master of Ceremonies. The luncheon is the Library’s largest fundraising event, providing the resources to maintain the nation’s most extensive broadcasting archives and collection of oral histories. The cocktail reception begins at 11:30 a.m. and the awards ceremony begins at noon.
The Honorees
DICK CLARK, once known as “America’s oldest living teenager,” is an emcee, television producer, game show host, commercial pitchman, restaurateur and entrepreneur. One of Hollywood’s powerhouses, he is most famous for hosting television’s longest-running music/variety program, American Bandstand, which aired on ABC from 1957 to 1987. The show played an important role in promoting rock music and gave many important acts their first national exposure, including music legends Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly and Jerry Lee Lewis. Clark has produced and hosted several other shows, including The $10,000 Pyramid (later The $100,000 Pyramid), TV’s Bloopers and Practical Jokes (with co-host Ed McMahon), the perennial year-ender Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve (first aired in 1972), and the daytime talk show The Other Half. He is also the founder and a director of the United Stations Radio Networks, which distributes more than 50 hours of weekly radio programming to nearly 3,000 radio stations. In recent years, Clark has hosted the nationally syndicated radio shows, Dick Clark’s Rock, Roll and Remember, Countdown America and Dick Clark’s Music Calendar. He was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 1990.
NORMAN CORWIN is considered one of the greatest writers in the English language, and has been called America’s “poet laureate of radio.” During the Golden Age of Radio in the 1930’s and 40’s Corwin wrote and produced many of the most powerful and influential programs ever created for the media, including 26 by Corwin, We Hold These Truths and his wartime broadcasts An American in England and On A Note of Triumph. He was among the first producers to regularly use entertainment to address serious social issues. Over the years, Corwin has worked in various media, publishing a number of books, and writing for the stage, television and the movies. His books include Trivializing America and Holes In A Stained Glass Window, as well as his collected correspondence, and many books of his scripts and poetry. Corwin’s movie script for Lust For Life, a biography of Van Gogh, won him an Oscar nomination. He also wrote and directed two plays produced on Broadway, The Rivalry (1959) and The World of Carl Sandburg (1960). Corwin returned to radio in the 1990s with a series of new programs written and directed for National Public Radio. These programs have been produced in full digital stereo with such luminaries as William Shatner, Jack Lemmon, Martin Landau, Hume Cronyn, Charles Durning, Samantha Eggar and many others.
SAM DONALDSON is a 42-year ABC News veteran and one of the most recognizable figures in broadcast news. He served as chief White House correspondent from 1977 to 1989 and again from 1998 to 1999, covering Presidents Carter, Reagan and Clinton. Donaldson also co-anchored Primetime Live with Diane Sawyer from 1989 until it merged with 20/20 in 1999 and co-anchored the ABC News Sunday morning broadcast This Week With Sam Donaldson & Cokie Roberts. Joining ABC News in 1967 as a Capitol Hill correspondent, Donaldson has covered such major events as the Vietnam War, Watergate, the House Judiciary Committee impeachment investigation in 1974 and the Gulf War. The ABC News veteran reported on every national political convention since 1964 with the exception of the 1992 Republican Convention in Houston. Donaldson also reported as an eyewitness to Spiro Agnew’s no contest plea in a Baltimore courtroom that forced Agnew to resign from the vice presidency. He was an eyewitness to the assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan’s life in 1981 and delivered the first report of the event on any broadcast medium on the ABC radio network. Donaldson is a four-time Emmy winner and one of the first journalists to broadcast online, with an Internet Web cast in the late 1990s.
EDWARD O. FRITTS served as president and CEO of the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) for more than two decades. As a result of Fritts’ leadership, NAB became known as one of the most respected and effective lobbying organizations in the U.S. and a significant force in reassessing media ownership rules and regulations, which resulted in fundamental changes for broadcasting. Among Fritts’ many achievements was his role as a catalyst for the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which is generally regarded as the most important legislation regulating media ownership in the last 50 years. In recognition of his achievements, Fritts has received several national honors, including the 2006 Broadcaster of the Year Award at both the New York State Broadcasters Association and the Pennsylvania Association of Broadcasters and induction into the Broadcasting & Cable Hall of Fame. Following his tenure at NAB, he launched The Fritts Group where he continues his work in the telecommunications arena offering strategic counsel in the areas of political consulting, government relations, international affairs and public relations.
HAL JACKSON is a radio pioneer and he has been one of the most respected figures in the communications industry for over 70 years. Jackson broke a number of racial barriers that have helped open doors for aspiring black broadcasters, musicians and performers. He was the first black radio announcer in network radio, the first black host of a jazz show on the ABC network and the first black to host an interracial network television show on NBC-TV. Jackson also organized and owned the first black team to win the World’s Basketball championship and he’s the first New York City radio personality to broadcast three daily shows on three different stations in the same day. He currently hosts a radio program which has been rated #1 continuously in its time slot for over 11 years on 107.5 WBLS in New York. For over 40 years, Jackson has been Executive Producer and Host of his Talented Teens International competition which highlights the intelligence, creativity and talents of young minority women. Past participants include Tammi Townsend, Vanessa Williams and Jada Pinkett Smith. Jackson was the first minority inducted into the National Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame and the first black inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame. He is also the creator of the idea to make Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday a national holiday.
AGNES NIXON, known as the “queen” of the modern soap opera because of her pivotal role in many daytime programs, created longstanding shows including Search for Tomorrow, One Life to Live, All My Children and Loving. She has also been a contributor to several other serials, including As the World Turns, Another World and The Guiding Light. Nixon is recognized as a pioneer in introducing social relevance to daytime television. Topics such as the Vietnam War, abortion, drug addiction, child abuse, racism and AIDS have been confronted in Nixon’s storylines since the early 1960s, transforming the traditionally conservative and escapist nature of daytime serials into a forum for relaying socially relevant messages. While topical and provocative storylines are now standard in daytime shows, when Nixon began writing her work was trailblazing. Nixon has written over 25,000 hours of television during a career that has spanned four decades and she is the winner of five Daytime Emmys.
LESLEY STAHL is marking her 20th season as a correspondent on CBS News’ 60 Minutes this year. The Emmy-award winning journalist has covered Washington since joining CBS in 1972, including events ranging from Watergate through the 1981 assassination attempt on President Reagan to the 1991 Gulf War. She has reported on every U.S. Russian summit meeting since 1978, every economic summit of industrialized countries since 1979 and every national political convention and election night since 1974. Stahl’s interviews with the families of the Duke Lacrosse players exonerated in a racial rape case and with Nancy Pelosi before she became the first woman to become speaker of the house were big scoops for 60 Minutes and CBS News. Stahl’s reports have appeared frequently on the CBS Evening News (with Walter Cronkite and Dan Rather), and on other CBS News broadcasts. She also served as moderator of Face The Nation between 1983 and 1991where she interviewed such newsmakers as Margaret Thatcher, Boris Yeltsin, Yasir Arafat and virtually every top U.S. official, including President George H. W. Bush and Vice President Dan Quayle.
Posthumous
RUE MCCLANAHAN helped make The Golden Girls a long-running television hit playing the man-devouring Southern belle Blanche Devereaux. The show seized the No. 1 rating its first night, in 1985, and stayed in the top 10 for six seasons, receiving several Emmys, one of which went to McClanahan for outstanding lead actress in a comedy series. McClanahan also appeared in the sitcom All in the Family, which broke ground with topical humor, and its spinoff Maude, in which she played Vivian Harmon, the best friend of the liberated, middle-aged title character. Her work includes more than 100 film, television and stage roles. McClanahan made her stage debut at age 4 in a local production of The Three Little Kittens and originated the role of Lady MacBird in MacBird!. After The Golden Girls ended in 1992, McClanahan appeared in a spinoff, The Golden Palace. She also acted in movies including Out to Sea, a comedy starring Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau, and on Broadway in Wicked. McClanahan campaigned for animal rights throughout her life.
DANIEL SCHORR was a journalist legend, longtime senior news analyst for National Public Radio and a veteran Washington journalist who broke major stories at home and abroad during the Cold War era and Watergate. His 62-year career spanned newspapers, radio and television. After serving in U.S. Army intelligence during World War II, Schorr began writing from Western Europe for the Christian Science Monitor and later The New York Times, reporting on postwar reconstruction, the Marshall Plan and the creation of the NATO alliance. He joined CBS News in 1953 as one of “Murrow’s boys,” the celebrated news team put together by Edward R. Murrow. After starting as a Washington-based diplomatic correspondent, Schorr was assigned to open a CBS bureau in Moscow and later landed the first exclusive TV interview with Soviet Leader Nikita Khrushchev. Later assigned to Germany, he covered the Berlin crisis and the building of the Berlin Wall. After leaving CBS, in 1979 Schorr was asked by Ted Turner to help create Cable News Network and served as CNN’s senior Washington correspondent until 1985. In addition to the three Emmys he won for his Watergate coverage, Schorr received the Alfred I. DuPont Columbia University Golden Baton for “Exceptional Contributions to Radio and Television Reporting and Commentary.” He also was honored with a George Foster Peabody personal award for a “lifetime of uncompromising reporting of the highest integrity.”
ART LINKLETTER was a radio and television talk-show pioneer who was best known for eliciting hilarious remarks from the mouths of children. In the 1950s and 1960s, he parlayed his talent for the “ad-libbed interview” into two of television’s longest-running shows, People Are Funny and House Party. Linkletter relied on ad-libbing, stunts and audience participation to get attention and keep listeners entertained. He had a particular talent in putting small children at ease, which he did regularly on an entertaining question-and-answer session on House Party, which provided the material for his best-selling book Kids Say the Darndest Things! illustrated by Charles M. Schulz, the creator of “Peanuts.” House Party aired five days a week on radio from 1945 to 1967 and on television from 1952 to 1969. Linkletter was also one of the fathers of modern reality TV with his show, People Are Funny, an audience participation quiz show that began on NBC in1954. He later became a popular motivational speaker and author, challenging seniors to live as zestfully as he did. Linkletter was also a crusader against drug use and an adviser to President Richard M. Nixon on drug policy.
The LIBRARY OF AMERICAN BROADCASTING (LAB) – located at the University of Maryland – is a 38-year-old institution serving as the national information resource for the radio and television industries and the academic communities that rely upon it for depth and expertise. Its collections of historic documents, professional papers, oral and video histories, books and photographs are the nation’s most extensive. LAB is evolving from a conventional library into a “homepage” for the world at large, no longer confined to responding to constituents one at a time but reaching thousands simultaneously through the Internet. Industry outreach includes lectures, symposia, print and the broadcast media themselves. LAB’s chairman is Ramsey Woodworth, veteran Washington communications attorney; the president/CEO is Donald West, veteran broadcast journalist and former assistant to the president of CBS Inc.; the dean of libraries at the University of Maryland is Patricia Steele and the curator is Chuck Howell.
The Library has been honoring leaders in the broadcasting industry annually since 2003 – its list of Giants now totals 116. Previous honorees include CBS Evening News’ Katie Couric, PBS’ Charlie Rose, Dennis Swanson of the Fox Television Stations Group, Walter Cronkite, CBS’ Frank Stanton, Bob Schieffer of CBS News, former president of Hearst Frank Bennack Jr. and the late Tim Russert of NBC.
GIANTS OF BROADCASTING FOR 2009
Katie Couric
Ken Burns
Dr. Woo Paik
Barbara Cochran
Christopher J. Rohrs
Norman J. Pattiz
Posthumous Honorees:
Ed McMahon
Bea Arthur
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