Richard ‘Dick’ Parsons
Daniel Acker | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Richard Parsons, who helped Time Warner divorce from AOL after what was thought-about one of many worst takeovers in historical past, has died. He was 76.
His dying was confirmed by Lazard, the place he was a longtime board member.
Parsons grew to become CEO of AOL Time Warner in 2002, changing Gerald Levin, who stepped apart two years after the media big’s disastrous $165 billion merger with the upstart web firm.
As CEO and later chairman, he led Time Warner’s turnaround, dropping “AOL” from the company’s identify and shrinking the corporate’s $30 billion in debt to $16.8 billion by promoting Warner Music and different properties.
“The merger didn’t work out fairly the best way many people anticipated. The web bubble burst and we needed to repair the leaks,” Parsons instructed The Independent in 2004. “It was not as monumental a activity as many individuals thought, as the basic companies of the previous Time Warner — like publishing, the cable networks and films — was operating properly.”
He stated that after the merger, AOL’s enterprise had collapsed and Warner Music Group was declining, together with all the music business. “So we offered our music enterprise, in addition to different nonstrategic property, to strengthen our steadiness sheet and put in new administration.”
Parsons stepped down from Time Warner in 2007.
The Rockefeller connection
Richard Dean “Dick” Parsons was born right into a working-class household on April 4, 1948, in Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant part and grew up in South Ozone Park in Queens, New York. He was a center youngster amongst 5 siblings.
He attended public college, skipping two grades, and at age 16, the 6-foot-4 Parsons enrolled on the University of Hawaii, the place he performed basketball and met his future spouse, Laura Ann Bush, whom he married in 1968.
After commencement, he returned to New York state to attend Albany Law School, moonlighting as a part-time janitor to assist pay his tuition and ending on the high of his class. During an internship on the New York state legislature, he developed ties to average Republican Gov. Nelson Rockefeller, who grew to become vp below Gerald Ford in 1974 within the wake of President Richard Nixon’s resignation. Parsons grew to become affiliate director of President Ford’s home coverage council.
“The old-boy community lives,” Parsons instructed The New York Times in a 1994 interview. “I did not develop up with any of the previous boys. I did not go to high school with any of the previous boys. But by turning into part of that Rockefeller entourage, that created for me a bunch of people that’ve appeared out for me ever since.”
After Ford’s defeat by Jimmy Carter within the 1976 election, Parsons returned to New York and joined the legislation agency of Patterson, Belknap, Webb & Tyler in 1977, as did his good friend Rudy Giuliani. Parsons and his spouse and three kids moved to Rockefeller nation, Briarcliff Manor in Westchester County. Coincidentally, his maternal grandfather had been a groundskeeper on John D. Rockefeller’s close by property, Kykuit.
Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, left, and Richard Parsons, CEO, Time Warner Inc. chat on the media welcome occasion hosted by Time Warner earlier than the Republican National Convention in New York, New York on August 28, 2004.
Dennis Brack | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Parson’s purchasers included Rockefeller’s widow, Happy, and the Dime Savings Bank of New York. In 1988, he accepted a suggestion to go Dime Bancorp, which had been struggling by way of the financial savings & mortgage disaster after aggressively approving high-risk mortgages as housing costs crashed. In 1989, it posted a $92.3 million loss. By the tip of 1993, after ordering large layoffs, Parsons helped the financial institution full a $300 million recapitalization. In 1995, he helped engineer Dime’s merger with Anchor Savings, creating one of many nation’s largest thrift establishments.
Parsons joined the Time Warner board on the advice of Rockefeller’s brother Laurance. He grew to become president of Time Warner in 1995.
As a Rockefeller Republican, Parsons thought-about himself a fiscal conservative and a social liberal. Parsons labored for Giuliani’s marketing campaign for New York mayor however stored a behind-the-scenes profile. ”I did not wish to be positioned because the Mayor’s Black man,” he instructed the Times just a few years later.
Giuliani put him in command of the mayoral transition staff in 1993 however Parsons turned down an offer to change into deputy mayor for fiscal affairs. His relationship with Giuliani later soured after the mayor tried to stress Time Warner Cable to hold the then-fledgling Fox News Channel in New York.
Two years after stepping down from Time Warner, Parsons grew to become chairman of Citigroup in 2009, serving to to stabilize the banking big within the wake of the monetary disaster. In May 2014, he was named interim CEO of the Los Angeles Clippers after the NBA banned proprietor Donald Sterling for all times as a result of he had made racist remarks.
“Like most Americans, I’ve been deeply troubled by the ache the Clippers’ staff, followers and companions have endured,” Parsons stated.
Parsons performed down race as an element of his success.
“For lots of people, race is a defining difficulty. It simply is not for me,” he instructed the Times in 1997. “It is … like air. It’s like top. I’ve different issues that I’m centered on.”
He later got here out of retirement to briefly function CBS chairman within the wake of Les Moonves‘ ouster following sexual harassment and assault allegations throughout the #MeToo motion.
After solely a month as CBS’ interim chairman, Parsons stepped down all of the sudden in October 2018, citing well being considerations.
“When I agreed to affix the board and function the interim chair, I used to be already coping with a severe well being problem — a number of myeloma — however I felt that the scenario was manageable,” Parsons stated in a CBS assertion asserting he had been changed by Strauss Zelnick. “Unfortunately, unanticipated problems have created further new challenges, and my medical doctors have suggested that chopping again on my present commitments is crucial to my general restoration.”
Parsons was lively in lots of charities, together with enjoying main roles for the Jazz Foundation of America, the Apollo Theater Foundation and the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. During his years on the Apollo Theater board, he helped the historic Harlem entertainment venue elevate almost $100 million. Parsons and his spouse additionally donated 40 artistic endeavors to the American Folk Art Museum in July 2021 to assist have fun its sixtieth anniversary.
