How Andy Taylor made Ted Turner

“We had rights to ‘Ironside’ and ‘Marcus Welby,’ two shows highly regarded on their networks but which turned out to be duds in syndication. We swapped them [to WSOC-TV, another Charlotte station] for ‘The Andy Griffith Show’… a huge hit that really helped turn the station around (and made us a lot of money for years to come).”

— From “Call Me Ted,” Ted Turner’s 2008 autobiography. In 1970 Turner had bought a struggling Charlotte UHF station and renamed it WRET (from his initials). In 1980 he sold the now-lucrative station to Westinghouse and used the proceeds to launch CNN.