2009 B&C Hall of Fame

Hosted by Brian William, Anchor and Managing Editor, NBC Nightly News

Guest Presenter: Mary Hart, Host of Entertainment Tonight

Click on the photos above or the links below to read capsule bios of the 2009 inductees. And check back to read full profiles, peruse photo galleries and watch video from the event.

2009 Inductees

• Richard Beaven
  CEO, Initiative Worldwide   Richard Beaven sits atop global media agency Initiative, part of the Interpublic Group's Mediabrands unit. He now adds B&C Hall of Famer to his already long list of industry honors, including Mediaweek's Media Executive of the Year and Advertising Age Media Maven.   The agency has had so much success between new client wins (worth $1.5 billion in...
• Linda Bell Blue
  Executive Producer, Entertainment Tonight and The Insider   Prior to Linda Bell Blue's arrival at Entertainment Tonight 15 years ago, entertainment news was comprised mostly of features and fluff. The Monett, Mo.-born Bell Blue had already spent years in the news trenches, having worked as the executive producer of Hard Copy for six years and as the executive producer of news at...
• Patrick Esser
  President, Cox Communications, Inc.    Patrick Esser, president of Cox Communications, wanted to be in the cable television business before most people knew what cable even was. While attending the University of Northern Iowa in the late 1970s, he got a job climbing poles and cutting in cable system taps, then moved on to selling door-to-door cable subscriptions for the local system...
• Jorge Ramos
  Anchorman, Noticiero Univision     Jorge Ramos' destiny is inextricably linked with that of Ronald Reagan, the 40th president of the United States. The assassination attempt on Reagan in 1981 presented Ramos, now anchor of Univision's Noticiero Univision, with the opportunity that would forever alter the course of his life.   Ramos was 22 years old, working and taking college...
• Abbe Raven
  President and CEO, A&E Television Networks    Since Abbe Raven, president and CEO of A&E Television Networks, joined the company in 1982, she has been a constant through vast changes in name, size and scope. As the company rebranded from Daytime to Daytime & Arts to A&E, it expanded with the addition of new channels and now encompasses A&E, History and Lifetime,...
• Johnathan Rodgers
  President and CEO of TV One   In 2006, TV One President and CEO Johnathan Rodgers planned to hold a meeting with radio host/CNN correspondent Roland Martin and a number of the channel's executives in Washington. After a scheduling mishap, Rodgers made an executive decision: "He was like, 'It's 2 o'clock,Roland has a 7 o'clock flight, we're meeting on the golf course,'"...
• Robert J. Ross
  Senior Vice President, East Coast Operations, CBS Television Network    As the man responsible for keeping the CBS network on the air, Bob Ross draws on experience that bridges the vendor, local station and network engineering communities and spans the technical curve from film-based news cameras to today's multi-platform, file-based world.   Ross, 57, is senior VP of East Coast...
• Jack Sander
  Senior Advisor, Belo Corp. Abroadcaster to the core, Jack Sander is doing more in semi-retirement than many others do in full-time jobs. His advisory role at Belo Corp. involves everything from meeting with vital lawmakers in Washington to being a sounding board for senior management, and even stepping in as general manager when the situation calls for it. Belo's Phoenix duopoly KTVK/KASW...
• David Verklin
  CEO, Canoe Ventures    David Verklin has spent nearly his entire career on the leading edge of advertising. Now that he's CEO of Canoe Ventures, that's never been more true. Cable industry leaders in 2008 turned to Verklin, long known as an energetic innovator, when they were looking to build the interactive and addressable advertising platform that they expect will change their...
• Tony Vinciquerra
  Chairman and CEO, Fox Networks Group    The word "measured" gets used a lot when people describe Tony Vinciquerra, Chairman and CEO of Fox Networks Group. In fact, he never gets too excited about anything, according to FX Networks President and General Manager John Landgraf. "I've never seen him ebullient at good news, and he never gets depressed at bad news,"...
• Jeff Zucker
  President and CEO, NBC Universal   Jeff Zucker thought he'd give this NBC thing two years. That's about how long his first job—as a researcher for the network's coverage of the 1988 Summer Olympics—was going to last. He'd gotten the network's offer the day he graduated from Harvard in 1986 with a degree in American history.   But Zucker's major bespeaks his other great...
• Monday Night Football
  Michael Phelps ain't a bad swimmer. And Roger Federer and Tiger Woods are two guys with pretty decent swings. In the annals of sports understatement, those are pretty good. But it would be impossible to top this one: At Monday Night Football, they know how to put on a good game.   In fact, MNF, now in its 40th season of gridiron glory, remade the way we watch live sports on television....