Broadcast icon Arledge dies
By BroadCasting & Cable Staff -- Broadcasting & Cable, 12/6/2002 6:00:00 AM
Roone Arledge -- who changed the way people watch TV as a prime mover in the development of news and sports programming -- died at 71 Thursday in New York of complications from cancer.
Arledge served as president of ABC Sports from 1968 through 1986, and he was behind the successful Monday Night Football and Wide World of Sports franchises.
"Before Roone Arledge there were no replays. There were no slow-mo machines," said Dick Ebersol, an Arledge protégé who later became the president of NBC Sports. "There was absolutely no prime time sports on any network."
Arledge was producer for 10 ABC Olympic Games broadcasts including the 1972 Munich Games, which turned into a major and tragic news event when Palestinian terrorists abducted and murdered 11 Israeli athletes.
He became president of ABC News in 1977, and he was behind World News Tonight, Nightline, 20/20, Primetime, This Week with David Brinkley and, ABC noted, This Week without David Brinkley.
Clearly recognized as a broadcasting giant, Arledge was a 37-time Emmy Award-winner and a member of Broadcasting & Cable's Hall of Fame.
ABC News won 20 Peabody Awards, as well as the DuPont-Columbia Gold Baton Award for overall excellence, under Arledge's leadership.
"Roone Arledge revolutionized television and, with it, the way people see and understand the world," said David Westin, who replaced Arledge as president of ABC News. "He was our leader and our friend, and we will miss his passion and his will to make us all better than we were."
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