The creator of such ABC Television milestones as Wide World of Sports, the most popular and most honored sports anthology series ever, and NFL Monday Night Football, the industry's longest-running prime time sports series, Roone Arledge then turned his innovative talents to ABC News and has enjoyed similar success.

Arledge served as student manager for the Mepham High School teams of Hall of Fame coach Sprig Gardner on Long Island.

At Columbia University, Roone continued his work as a wrestling manager and even participated in intramural wrestling.

Success in wrestling is just not in the cards for every young person. Wrestling, however, gratefully accepts support from whoever is willing to give it even though the individual may not have been a great athlete or coach.

Arledge was producer for 10 Olympic Games, including the 1984 telecasts which reached 180 million viewers in the United States and 2.5 billion worldwide. In 1989 he was inducted into the Olympic Hall of Fame. Arledge has won a total of 36 Emmy Awards.

He began with the Dumont Television Network in 1952 and spent six years with NBC, starting in 1955. He became vice president of ABC network sports in 1963, advanced to president of ABC Sports in 1968 and added the title of president of ABC News in 1977, continuing in a dual role until 1985, when he was named Group President of ABC News and Sports.

Arledge has won four George Foster Peabody Awards and a gold medal from the International Radio and Television Society. He was named Man of Year by the National Association of Television Program Executives, and was elected to the Hall of Fame of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in 1990.