Ted Turner — May 6, 2026

Ted Turner did more than change the news. He changed the way Americans expected information to arrive. When CNN launched in 1980 as the world’s first 24-hour cable news network, plenty of industry insiders called the idea reckless. Turner pressed forward anyway, and within a decade, around-the-clock news had become the new normal for living rooms across the country. Anyone who watched the Gulf War unfold live in 1991 watched a piece of his vision come to life.

Born in Cincinnati and raised in the South, he built the Turner Broadcasting System into a media empire that included TBS, TNT, and Cartoon Network. He owned the Atlanta Braves through their most beloved era, won the America’s Cup as a yachtsman in 1977, and became one of the country’s most generous philanthropists, donating one billion dollars to establish the United Nations Foundation. Ted Turner passed away at the age of 87, a true American original whose fingerprints are still visible on the media landscape and the conservation movement he championed.