Annenberg, Walter

Annenberg, Walter (Hubert)

(1908–  ) publisher, philanthropist; born in Milwaukee, Wis. Inheriting a communications empire that included the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Racing Forum, and broadcast stations, he founded Seventeen Magazine (1944) and the immensely successful TV Guide (1953), and purchased the Philadelphia Daily News (1957). A prominent Republican, he served as U.S. ambassador to Britain (1969–74). He assembled a large art collection that he donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and he amassed a huge fortune, some of which he used to endow a graduate school of communications at the University of Pennsylvania.

The Cambridge Dictionary of American Biography, by John S. Bowman. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995. Reproduced with permission.