Ted Turner — the bullish founder of CNN and a suite of other cable channels, not to mention a bison steakhouse, a nonprofit designed to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons and an international sports competition — died Wednesday at the age of 87. He had announced just before his 80th birthday that he had Lewy Body Dementia, a degenerative disease that causes dementia and muscle failure.
Turner never seemed at a loss for brass or chutzpah. "If Alexander the Great could conquer the known world, why couldn't I start CNN?" Turner once told Oprah Winfrey.
He launched the Cable News Network — the nation's first continuous all-news television station — on June 1, 1980 at a converted Jewish country club in Atlanta. The network broadcast news 24/7 from that point on and indeed built a global array of bureaus.
Former CNN chief news executive Eason Jordan says Turner took inspiration from 24-hour radio stations that relayed news headlines, and endless sports highlights on ESPN. Turner remained baffled why the broadcast giants — ABC, NBC and CBS — hadn't launched cable stations. "To him it was just the most logical thing in the world and he couldn't understand why nobody else was doing it," Jordan says. "So he was going to do it."
Sixteen years later, NBC (in partnership with Microsoft) and Fox would launch sibling cable news channels. Each ultimately found success by embracing strong (though opposing) points of view. Broadcast networks subsequently sought to replicate the original cable ethos with stripped down streaming services.
Turner, a colorful figure with a Southern drawl and rail-thin mustache, had pronounced views himself, often (though not exclusively) of a liberal bent. But he wanted his station to reflect the news, not ideology. He thought human understanding across borders would benefit from reporting on stories and people around the world.
