Biography

Producer of the Watergate hearings who helped broadcast the Senate Watergate hearings to a national audience and who later made crucial contributions that allowed the PBS News Hour (1975) to rival commercial news programs in prestige if not in profit.

Named president of MacNeil/Lehrer Productions in 1983 and worked on the PBS News Hour (1975) and related documentaries until his retirement in 1996.

After two years of Army service in Germany during the Korean War he began working his way through the ranks of NBC Rockefeller Center from the mail room. In 1971 was manager of NBC's East Coast producers when he left to join the public-television service NPACT.

Took a more active role in national politics in 1976, when he took a leave of absence to serve as a television consultant to Democratic presidential nominee Jimmy Carter. He also produced the party's national convention that summer in New York, tailoring its timing and tone for a television audience.