WEAVER, Sylvester L(aflin) 1908-2002

OBITUARY NOTICE—See index for CA sketch: Born December 21, 1908, in Los Angeles, CA; died of pneumonia March 15, 2002, in Santa Barbara, CA. Television executive and author. Weaver was involved in television in its early years and is credited with helping to shape how the industry is run today. He graduated from Dartmouth College with a bachelor's degree in 1930 and spent his early years as a writer, producer, and radio program director for the Columbia Broadcast System, Inc. (CBS). He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II and was an executive for Young & Rubicam and American Tobacco through the 1940s. In 1949 he joined the National Broadcast Company, Inc. (NBC) as vice president in charge of television; he later became vice chair, president, and then chair. Weaver had high hopes for television, seeing it as a way to help spread culture and the arts to average citizens. On the business end he was instrumental in restructuring how programming was paid for; instead of having company sponsors determine programming as had been done in radio, the television network took over programming and sold time to advertisers. Weaver also kept Meet the Press on the air when it was in danger of being canceled, launched comedian Sid Caesar's Your Show of Shows, and created the Today and Tonight news talk shows and the Wide Wide World series. Weaver was replaced by Robert Sarnoff, son of NBC's owner, in 1955. Although he was made chairman of the board at the network, Weaver resigned the following year. He moved on to other ventures, such as an early attempt at running a cable television company and heading Intercept TV, a subscription channel that focused on the arts. In his later years he also devoted time to charitable organizations, serving as chair of the American Heart Association from 1959 to 1963 and board member and president of the Muscular Dystrophy Association during the 1960s and 1970s. Weaver, who received a Peabody Award and two Emmy Awards for his television work, was the coauthor of 1994's The Best Seat in the House: The Golden Years in Radio and Television.

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

BOOKS

Writers Directory, 14th edition, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1999.

PERIODICALS

Los Angeles Times, March 18, 2002, pp. A1, A12.

New York Times, March 18, 2002, p. A25.

Washington Post, March 18, 2002, p. B6.