John S. Hendricks
| John Hendricks | |
|---|---|
| Born |
John Samuel Hendricks March 29, 1952 Matewan, West Virginia, USA |
| Occupation | Businessperson |
| Known for | Founder of Discovery Communications |
| Awards | International Emmy Founders Award (2000) |
John Samuel Hendricks (born March 29, 1952) is an American businessman and is the founder and chairman of Discovery Communications, a broadcasting and film production company which owns the Discovery Channel, TLC and Animal Planet networks, among other ventures. On March 20, 2014, after 32 years at the helm, he made public his decision to retire early from the board and leadership of Discovery Communications after the annual shareholders' meeting of May 16, 2014. He moved on to found CuriosityStream, an ad-free, on-demand nonfiction streaming service.
Born in Matewan, West Virginia, Hendricks' father was a home builder and his mother a clerk for city government. In 1958, the Hendricks family moved to Huntsville, Alabama, where Hendricks grew up. His father died when he was 20, and his mother died when he was 30. He attended S.R. Butler High School where he met his first wife, Pattie Miller. Hendricks graduated from the University of Alabama in Huntsville, and he received his bachelor's degree in history in 1974. While a student at UAH he worked in the audio visual department where he had the idea to bring documentaries to the public.
He was hired as director of community and government relations for the University of Alabama in Huntsville the year he graduated, and became director of corporate and foundation relations for the University of Maryland in 1975. While at the University of Maryland, he co-founded a fund-raising consulting company, the American Association of University Consultants, with Edward M. Peabody, and published several newsletters aimed at academic disciplines such as chemistry.
John Hendricks founded the Cable Educational Network, Inc., in Bethesda, Maryland, in 1982 to provide documentary programming to cable broadcasters. On June 17, 1985, Hendricks launched the Discovery Channel with $5 million in start-up capital led by the American investment firm Allen & Company. Today, Discovery's main shareholders include John Malone, chairman of Liberty Media, and Advance/Newhouse (publishers of Vanity Fair, New Yorker, and Vogue).
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