AROUND THE QUADS
Alumni News
ARLEDGE:
Television pioneer and University Trustee Roone Arledge ’52,
who headed both ABC News and ABC Sports, died on December 5 of complications
from cancer at the age of 71.
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Roone Arledge |
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At ABC Sports, Arledge headed the network’s acclaimed Olympics
coverage, developed technological advances such as instant replays
and slow motion video and created long-running shows including Wide
World of Sports and Monday Night Football. He later
revitalized ABC News, attracting leading newspeople to
the network and developing shows such as 20/20, Nightline,
World News Tonight and This Week With David Brinkley.
Life magazine selected him as one of the 100 most important Americans
of the 20th century and Sports Illustrated ranked him as
the third most important figure in sports during the past 40 years,
after Muhammad Ali and Michael Jordan.
David Westin, president of ABC News, remembered Arledge
for his “unique creative genius coupled with an absolute refusal
to settle for anything less than the very best. He was a perfectionist.
He spurred us to give our personal best and to make better whatever
it was we were doing.”
At Columbia, Arledge was on the staff of Spectator and
was editor of the Columbian. In 1998, he was presented with the
Alexander Hamilton Medal, the College’s highest honor. He
is the benefactor of the largest auditorium on campus, the Roone
Arledge Auditorium and Cinema in Alfred Lerner Hall.
“Roone loved Columbia and needed no prodding to reminisce
about his days spent here,” said University President Lee
C. Bollinger, noting that Arledge’s 1952 classmates include
other media giants such as Larry Grossman, Max Frankel and Richard
Wald. Dean Austin Quigley called Arledge “a true son of Columbia,
someone for whom the curtain was always rising and a new show was
always about to begin.”
A.S.
[Editor’s note: A complete obituary will appear in the March
issue of CCT.]
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