John Siceloff (October 21, 1953 – March 6, 2015) was an American

television producer A television producer is a person who oversees one or more aspects of video production on a television show, television program. Some producers take more of an executive role, in that they conceive new programs and pitch them to the television net ...

. He was born in Frogmore, South Carolina. He created and was

executive producer Executive producer (EP) is one of the top positions in the making of a commercial entertainment product. Depending on the medium, the executive producer may be concerned with management accounting or associated with legal issues (like copyrights o ...

of the

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...

news magazine A news magazine is a typed, printed, and published magazine, radio or television program, usually published weekly, consisting of articles about current events. News magazines generally discuss stories, in greater depth than do newspapers or new ...

, '' NOW on PBS''.

Career

A graduate of

Swarthmore College Swarthmore College ( , ) is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1864, with its first classes held in 1869, Swarthmore is one of the earliest coeduca ...

with a bachelor's degree in

history History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the History of writing#Inventions of writing, invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbr ...

he continued his education at

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

, earning a master's degree in

communications Communication (from la, communicare, meaning "to share" or "to be in relation with") is usually defined as the transmission of information. The term may also refer to the message communicated through such transmissions or the field of inquir ...

. Siceloff has been a producer for ABC's ''

20/20 Visual acuity (VA) commonly refers to the clarity of vision, but technically rates an examinee's ability to recognize small details with precision. Visual acuity is dependent on optical and neural factors, i.e. (1) the sharpness of the retinal ...

'' and ''Primetime Live'' and a senior broadcast producer for ''

ABC News ABC News is the news division of the American broadcast network ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast ''ABC World News Tonight, ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other programs include Breakfast television, morning ...

'' as well as NBC's ''NOW'', '' Dateline NBC'' and ''Prime Story''. During 2001 he joined

and in 2004 he became founder and CEO of JumpStart Productions, which produced '' NOW on PBS''. He was a trustee of Penn Center in the South Carolina Sea Islands, which had been one of the few places in the south where interracial groups could meet during the age of segregation. His father, Courtney Siceloff, was director of Penn Center from 1950 to 1969. Martin Luther King was a frequent visitor and used the facility for his Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

Honors and awards

Siceloff has been the recipient of many honors and awards including the

Alfred I. duPont-Columbia Award Alfred may refer to: Arts and entertainment *''Alfred J. Kwak'', Dutch-German-Japanese anime television series * ''Alfred'' (Arne opera), a 1740 masque by Thomas Arne * ''Alfred'' (Dvořák), an 1870 opera by Antonín Dvořák *"Alfred (Interlu ...

and the

Peabody award The George Foster Peabody Awards (or simply Peabody Awards or the Peabodys) program, named for the American businessman and philanthropist George Peabody, honor the most powerful, enlightening, and invigorating stories in television, radio, and ...

for his work with ''ABC News coverage of the aftermath of the

September 11, 2001 attacks The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial ...

. He has also received National News

Emmy The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...

Awards for ''ABC News'' segments on the Millennium celebrations and NBC's "The Terror Connection;" a CINE Eagle Award for ABC's "Guatemala;" and an

Imagen Award The Imagen Awards are administered by the Imagen Foundation, an organization dedicated to "encouraging and recognizing the positive portrayals of Latinos in the entertainment industry." To be considered for an Imagen Award, a media piece or person ...

for ABC's "Latin Beat." He also received the Edward R. Murrow Award, Overseas Press Club for a story on

child brides A child (plural, : children) is a human being between the stages of childbirth, birth and puberty, or between the Development of the human body, developmental period of infancy and puberty. The legal definition of ''child'' generally refers ...

for ''NOW on PBS'' and was also awarded a National Business

Award in 2007 and a National News Emmy Award for best news magazine segment in 2004 also for ''NOW on PBS''. In 2009, Siceloff created Catch the Next, Inc., a not for profit organization with the mission to increase the educational attainment of Latinos and the underserved. In 2012, in collaboration with Dr. Maria Chavez he created the Texas College Success Program now called Ascender. The program's framework for student and institutional advancement has increased the rate of college completion for students in community colleges.

Death

He died on March 6, 2015, at his home in

Dutchess County, New York Dutchess County is a county in the U.S. state of New York. As of the 2020 census, the population was 295,911. The county seat is the city of Poughkeepsie. The county was created in 1683, one of New York's first twelve counties, and later orga ...

of prostate cancer.

Books

*''Your America: Democracy's Local Heroes'' ()

Footnotes

External links

Your America: Democracy's Local Heroes
Television producers from New York City American television reporters and correspondents American non-fiction writers People from Beaufort, South Carolina 1953 births Living people American male journalists Journalists from New York City {{US-journalist-1950s-stub