Richard Douglas Heffner (August 5, 1925 – December 17, 2013) was the creator and host of '' The Open Mind,'' a public affairs television show first broadcast in 1956. He was a University Professor of Communications and Public Policy at

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College, and wa ...

and also taught an honors seminar at

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then- Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, ...

. He was the author of ''A Documentary History of the United States,'' a verbatim anthology of important public documents in American history, among them the

Declaration of Independence A declaration of independence or declaration of statehood or proclamation of independence is an assertion by a polity in a defined territory that it is independent and constitutes a state. Such places are usually declared from part or all of ...

, the

Gettysburg Address The Gettysburg Address is a speech that U.S. President Abraham Lincoln delivered during the American Civil War at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery, now known as Gettysburg National Cemetery, in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania on the ...

and Martin Luther King Jr.'s

Letter from Birmingham Jail The "Letter from Birmingham Jail", also known as the "Letter from Birmingham City Jail" and "The Negro Is Your Brother", is an open letter written on April 16, 1963, by Martin Luther King Jr. It says that people have a moral responsibility to ...

. Heffner collaborated with Nobel Peace Prize winner

Elie Wiesel Elie Wiesel (, born Eliezer Wiesel ''Eliezer Vizel''; September 30, 1928 – July 2, 2016) was a Romanian-born American writer, professor, political activist, Nobel laureate, and Holocaust survivor. He authored 57 books, written mostly in Fr ...

on the publication of ''Conversations With Elie Wiesel'', released by Schocken books in 2001.

Career

A protégé of Edward R. Murrow, Heffner helped establish what is now

WNET WNET (channel 13), branded on-air as "Thirteen" (stylized as "THIRTEEN"), is a primary PBS member television station licensed to Newark, New Jersey, United States, serving the New York City area. Owned by The WNET Group (formerly known as the ...

(Channel 13) in New York City and was its first general manager, from 1961–63. From 1974–94 Heffner was chairman of the

Classification and Rating Administration The Motion Picture Association film rating system is used in the United States and its territories to rate a motion picture's suitability for certain audiences based on its content. The system and the ratings applied to individual motion pictures ...

(CARA) of the

Motion Picture Association of America The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the five major film studios of the United States, as well as the video streaming service Netflix. Founded in 1922 as the Motion Picture Producers and Distri ...

(MPAA). Heffner earned his BA (1946) and MA (1947) degrees in history from

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manha ...

. He taught two courses at

. "Mass Communications and the American Image" is taught through the School of Communication, Information and Library Studies, while "Communication and Human Values" is an honors undergraduate seminar taught through the School of Arts and Sciences. He also taught the same honors undergraduate course, "Communication and Human Values", at

Death

Heffner died of a

cerebral hemorrhage Intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH), also known as cerebral bleed, intraparenchymal bleed, and hemorrhagic stroke, or haemorrhagic stroke, is a sudden bleeding into the tissues of the brain, into its ventricles, or into both. It is one kind of bleed ...

on December 17, 2013, aged 88.Richard Heffner, Historian, Teacher, Pioneer of Public Television, is Dead at 88

References

External sources

Rutgers University
Richard D. Heffner

(1952) 1925 births 2013 deaths American television personalities Male television personalities American humanities academics Rutgers University faculty Columbia College (New York) alumni Place of birth missing Place of death missing Columbia Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni {{US-tv-bio-stub

Career

Death

See also

References

External sources