ByBrian Stelter and Ann O'Neill 
Wednesday, May 6, 2026 2:20PM
Ted Turner, the media maverick and philanthropist who founded CNN, a pioneering 24-hour web that revolutionized tv news, died Wednesday, according to a quality merchandise from Turner Enterprises. He was 87.
The Ohio-born Atlanta businessman, nicknamed "The Mouth of the South" for his outspoken nature, built a media empire that encompassed cable's archetypal superstation and fashionable channels for movies and cartoons, positive nonrecreational sports teams similar the Atlanta Braves.

Ted Turner
CNN via CNN Newsource
Turner was besides an internationally known yachtsman; a philanthropist who founded the United Nations Foundation; an activistic who sought the worldwide elimination of atomic weapons; and a conservationist who became 1 of the foremost landowners successful the United States. He played a important relation successful reintroducing bison to the American west. He adjacent created the Captain Planet cartoon to amended kids astir the environment.
But it was his audacious imaginativeness to present quality from astir the satellite successful existent time, astatine each hours, that truly made him celebrated - erstwhile his thought yet took off.
In 1991, Turner was named Time magazine's Man of the Year for "influencing the dynamic of events and turning viewers successful 150 countries into instant witnesses of history."
Turner yet sold his networks to Time Warner and aboriginal exited the business, but continued to explicit pridefulness successful CNN, calling it the "greatest achievement" of his life.
"Ted was an intensely progressive and committed leader, intrepid, fearless and ever consenting to backmost a hunch and spot his ain judgement," Mark Thompson, Chairman and CEO of CNN Worldwide, said successful a statement. "He was and ever volition beryllium the presiding tone of CNN. Ted is the elephantine connected whose shoulders we stand, and we volition each instrumentality a infinitesimal contiguous to admit him and his interaction connected our lives and the world."
Just implicit a period earlier his 80th day successful 2018, Turner revealed that helium had Lewy assemblage dementia, a progressive encephalon disorder. In aboriginal 2025, Turner was hospitalized with a mild lawsuit of pneumonia earlier recovering astatine a rehabilitation facility.
Turner is survived by his 5 children, 14 grandchildren, and 2 great-grandchildren.
This is simply a processing communicative and volition beryllium updated.
The CNN Wire™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.

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