William F Rasmussen, co founder of the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network (ESPN), passed away on 18 August 2026 at his home in Land O’ Lakes, Florida, at the age of 93. His family and ESPN historian confirmed he died from the effects of Parkinson’s disease, which he had disclosed in 2019 after being diagnosed in 2014. Rasmussen had launched ESPN on 7 September 1979 with his son Scott Rasmussen as the world’s first 24 hour sports television network.
Who Was William F Rasmussen
William F Rasmussen, widely known as Bill Rasmussen, was an American sports broadcaster, entrepreneur and television executive best known as the co founder and first president and chief executive of ESPN. He was born on 15 October 1932 in Chicago, Illinois, and was raised on the city’s South Side in the neighbourhood of Columbus Manor. He later credited his lifelong love of sports, especially baseball as a third baseman at Gage Park High School, for shaping his career.
Rasmussen earned a bachelor’s degree in Economics from DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, in 1954 on a scholarship, where he met his future wife Lois (Mickey). After graduation he served in the United States Air Force as a supply officer near the end of the Korean War. He later earned a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from Rutgers University in 1960 while working for Westinghouse Electric in New Jersey. His son Scott Rasmussen, who would become his co founder, was born in 1956.
He was predeceased by his wife of 56 years, Lois, in 2011, and is survived by two sons Scott and Glenn, daughter Lynn Van Hollebeke, seven grandchildren, and two great grandchildren. ESPN Chairman Jimmy Pitaro described him as a visionary whose passion and entrepreneurial spirit made ESPN possible.
Early Career Before ESPN
Rasmussen’s working life blended business, military and broadcasting experience. After his MBA, he started an advertising services business in Newark, New Jersey, in 1960, with Westinghouse as his first customer. He then walked away from that venture to pursue sports broadcasting.
His broadcasting work began at WTTT (1430 AM) radio in Amherst, Massachusetts, in 1962-63, where he created the first radio network for University of Massachusetts football and basketball. In 1965 he moved to WWLP-TV (NBC) Springfield, Massachusetts, where he spent eight years as sports director and two years as news director and evening news anchor, handling play by play for football, basketball, baseball and hockey.
In 1974 he joined the New England Whalers of the World Hockey Association (WHA), a professional ice hockey team based in Hartford, Connecticut, as communications director. The WHA was a rival league to the National Hockey League that operated from 1972 to 1979. At the end of the 1977-78 season, the Whalers fired the entire front office, including Rasmussen and his son Scott, who was also working for the team. The job loss pushed Rasmussen to look for a new path in cable television.
The Idea That Built a 24 Hour Sports Network
From a Connecticut Sports Channel to a National Dream
Rasmussen’s first plan was modest. With Ed Eagan, an insurance agent and eye doctor who had shown interest in television, and later with associate Bob Beyus, he wanted to create a monthly cable show covering Connecticut sports, such as the Whalers, the Bristol Red Sox and the Connecticut Huskies. Cable television then reached fewer than 20 percent of American homes, and when the group pitched the idea on 26 June 1978 to twelve local cable operators, only five came and most called it impractical.
Research into distribution changed the plan. A visit to United Cable led them to RCA, which had launched the Satcom I communications satellite. An RCA representative, Al Parinello, explained that satellite delivery could carry their channel across the country and that buying a full 24 hour transponder was cheaper than sending signals across Connecticut by landlines. The group saw the chance to fill 8,760 hours a year, the total hours in a year, with programming.
The famous turning point came on a Friday afternoon in August 1978. Rasmussen and Scott were stuck in traffic on Interstate 84 in Connecticut while driving to the New Jersey shore and were brainstorming how to fill the satellite time they had optioned. Scott joked about showing football all day, and Rasmussen blurted out the idea of a channel devoted only to sports. Both sports fans at heart, they realised they had an idea with national appeal. On 16 August 1978, father and son agreed the channel would show all kinds of sports around the clock, with a nightly half hour sports news show, its own sportscasters and a fleet of broadcast trucks.
The venture was formally incorporated as the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network (ESP) on 13-14 July 1978 for a fee of 91 dollars. The family and associates pooled about 30,000 dollars to secure the satellite transponder from RCA. Even though they had no money for the first payment immediately, the contract allowed payment 90 days after first use of the satellite, so they signed it.
How Funding, Property and Programme Deals Came Together
The Rasmussens first looked for headquarters in Plainville, Connecticut, but a local ordinance banning rooftop satellite dishes blocked them. Instead they bought a parcel for 18,000 dollars in Bristol, Connecticut, a former dump site where the satellite signal was clear. That site became ESPN Plaza at 935 Middle Street, still the headquarters today.
Money remained the biggest hurdle. They used a 9,000 dollar advance on a credit card to keep the venture going, pitched dozens of investors and faced repeated rejections. Help came through investment firm K.S. Sweet Associates and interim backers J. B. Doherty and associates, who introduced the idea to Stuart Evey, vice president for non oil operations at Getty Oil Company. Getty was looking to diversify beyond oil. On 22 February 1979, Getty Oil agreed in principle to buy 85 percent of ESPN with an investment of more than 10 million dollars, giving the start up instant credibility.
Two other deals completed the foundation. In the spring of 1979, Anheuser-Busch signed the largest advertising contract in cable history at the time, worth about 1.4 million dollars, to be the exclusive beer advertiser on the network. And on 7 February 1979, Rasmussen secured an agreement in principle with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) to broadcast college sports. At that time the major networks showed only the Final Four of the men’s basketball tournament. ESPN would carry the early rounds in March 1980, later branded as March Madness, along with hundreds of other college events. The Getty investment and the NCAA deal were finalised on the same day, sealing the project.
Launch of ESPN and Early Years
At 7 p.m. Eastern Time on 7 September 1979, the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network went on air from its still unfinished broadcast centre in Bristol. The signal was beamed from an earth station in Bristol to the RCA Satcom I satellite, 22,300 miles above the equator, and down to about 1.4 million cable homes. About 30,000 viewers watched the very first moments.
The first programme was SportsCenter, the network’s flagship daily sports news show, hosted by Lee Leonard and George Grande. Leonard opened with the now famous line that if viewers were fans they had gone to sports heaven. Grande then announced the first score, Chris Evert’s victory over Billie Jean King at the US Open. ESPN was the first channel to tell viewers it would show sports news in a dedicated half hour format every day, covering scores, highlights, previews and features for amateur, professional, national and international events.
The first live event followed immediately, a men’s professional slow pitch softball World Series game between the Milwaukee Schlitz and the Kentucky Bourbons from Lannon, Wisconsin, with commentary by Joe Boyle. Early weeks were lean. The staff worked from construction trailers and went without running water for weeks, and programming relied on college football, wrestling, softball and other niche sports. Yet the network had momentum.
Rasmussen served as ESPN’s first president and chief executive, and in July 1979 became chairman when former NBC Sports president Chet Simmons was hired as president. Under Rasmussen’s leadership ESPN introduced round the clock sports and the early round NCAA tournament coverage that drew national attention in 1980. By the end of 1983, ESPN had become the largest cable channel in the United States with 28.5 million households and had begun distributing programming outside the United States.
Rasmussen left active management in October 1980 and formally parted ways when the company was sold on 25 June 1984. Getty had found the venture too capital intensive to fund major rights alone, so control passed to buyers with deeper media resources.
Life After ESPN, Recognition and Legacy
After leaving ESPN, Rasmussen remained an entrepreneur and adviser. He consulted for the Big Ten Conference on television strategy and for many start up media and internet companies. His digital ventures included chairing the Attitude Network which owned early internet sites Happy Puppy and Games Domain, and founding the College Fanz Sports Network, one of the first online communities dedicated to college sports, and the game site SportsatHome.
His relationship with ESPN was distant for years, but it was repaired in 1999 when executives invited him to the 20th anniversary celebration. He later toured for the 40th anniversary in 2019 and was welcomed at Walt Disney Company and ESPN events. Colleagues often called him the George Washington of ESPN, a title used by longtime anchor Chris Berman, for being the founding figure.
Honours followed. He was named to The Sports 100, listing the 100 most important people in American sports history, called the Father of sports television by USA Today in 1994, inducted into the Connecticut Sports Museum and Hall of Fame in 1997, placed on Rutgers University’s Wall of Fame in 2002, on DePauw University’s Media Wall of Fame in 2012, and finally into the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame in 2025. He also authored two books, Sports Junkies Rejoice! The Birth of ESPN and ESPN: One Giant Leap for Fankind (2023), and collaborated on the documentary and book project Sports Heaven: The Birth of ESPN, released in 2026, which ESPN replayed in his honour.
Family remained central. He married his DePauw sweetheart Lois, and remained an active alumnus, helping promote DePauw’s historic Monon Bell football rivalry with Wabash College. In his later years he advocated for Parkinson’s awareness through the American Parkinson Disease Association and the Michael J. Fox Foundation.
About ESPN Today
ESPN, which today stands simply as ESPN after dropping its full name in 1985, is still headquartered in Bristol, Connecticut, at ESPN Plaza. The company was incorporated in July 1978 and launched in September 1979 as the world’s first all sports satellite delivered cable network on Satcom I, Transponder 7.
Its ownership has changed through some of the largest media deals in American history. Getty Oil bought 85 percent in 1979. In 1984, the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) bought 100 percent of ESPN from Getty following the Texaco Getty merger. ABC later sold 20 percent to Nabisco, which then sold it to the Hearst Corporation, which still holds a stake. In 1985, Capital Cities Communications bought ABC for 3.5 billion dollars, and in 1996 the Walt Disney Company bought Capital Cities/ABC for 19 billion dollars and took control of ESPN.
Today ESPN, LLC is a joint venture owned 72 percent by The Walt Disney Company through ABC Inc., 18 percent by Hearst Communications, and 10 percent by the National Football League. It operates eight U.S. television networks, including ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, ESPNews, ESPN Deportes, SEC Network and ACC Network, plus the streaming service ESPN+, ESPN.com, ESPN Radio and businesses on every continent. The Bristol campus covers more than 1.3 million square feet in 18 buildings on 120 acres and includes the Digital Center 1 and 2 complexes of more than 400,000 square feet. James Pitaro has served as chairman since 5 March 2018.
Key Takeaways
- William F Rasmussen, co founder of ESPN, died on 18 August 2026 at age 93 at his home in Land O’ Lakes, Florida, from effects of Parkinson’s disease.
- ESPN was co founded by Bill Rasmussen, his son Scott Rasmussen and Ed Eagan, incorporated on 13-14 July 1978 and launched on 7 September 1979 at 7 p.m. ET from Bristol, Connecticut.
- The idea was conceived in August 1978 while Rasmussen and Scott were stuck in traffic on Interstate 84 in Connecticut and was built around a 24 hour transponder on RCA Satcom I.
- Getty Oil bought 85 percent of ESPN on 22 February 1979 for more than 10 million dollars and Anheuser-Busch signed a 1.4 million dollar exclusive beer advertising deal in spring 1979.
- The first programme was SportsCenter with anchors Lee Leonard and George Grande, followed by a slow pitch softball game between the Milwaukee Schlitz and Kentucky Bourbons.
- ESPN, originally Entertainment and Sports Programming Network, is now ESPN, LLC, owned 72 percent by Disney via ABC Inc., 18 percent by Hearst and 10 percent by the NFL, and is headquartered at ESPN Plaza, 935 Middle Street, Bristol, Connecticut.
