Thomas F. O'Neil (1915–1998) was the chairman of

RKO General RKO General Inc. (previously General Teleradio Inc. and RKO Teleradio Pictures Inc.) was an American broadcasting company that, from 1952 through 1991, served as the main holding company for the noncore businesses of the General Tire and Rubber C ...

studios who brought movies to television and experimented with an early coin-operated

pay TV Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichannel television providers, b ...

system.

Early years

O'Neil was born in

Kansas City, Missouri Kansas City, Missouri, abbreviated KC or KCMO, is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri by List of cities in Missouri, population and area. The city lies within Jackson County, Missouri, Jackson, Clay County, Missouri, Clay, and Pl ...

, on April 18, 1915. He graduated from

College of the Holy Cross The College of the Holy Cross is a private Jesuit liberal arts college in Worcester, Massachusetts, United States. It was founded by educators Benedict Joseph Fenwick and Thomas F. Mulledy in 1843 under the auspices of the Society of Jesus. ...

, where he was a star football player, in 1937. Beginning in 1941, he served five years in the

United States Coast Guard The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is the maritime security, search and rescue, and Admiralty law, law enforcement military branch, service branch of the armed forces of the United States. It is one of the country's eight Uniformed services ...

Career

O'Neil's career began with the

General Tire and Rubber Company Continental Tire the Americas, LLC, d.b.a. General Tire, is an American manufacturer of tires for motor vehicles, and semi trucks. Founded in 1915 in Akron, Ohio by William Francis O'Neil, Winfred E. Fouse, Charles J. Jahant, Robert Iredell, ...

, which his father William F. O'Neil had founded. O'Neil was running the tire company's Boston office when he visited the offices of the Yankee Network, a radio network the company had invested in to regain radio advertising costs. O'Neil was back from the war in the Pacific when he formed General Teleradio in 1948 by combining the Yankee Network with a station operating in a new medium.

WNAC-TV WNAC-TV (channel 64), branded Fox Providence, is a television station in Providence, Rhode Island, United States, affiliated with Fox Broadcasting Company, Fox and The CW. It is owned by Mission Broadcasting, which maintains a local marketing ...

's first telecasts went to exactly two small-screen television sets placed in the Jordan Marsh department store in Boston. It was his television stations' need for programming that led O'Neil to start buying the broadcast rights to movies. Some Hollywood studios boycotted the venture for fear that giving away movies on television free would undermine their theater business, and O'Neil had to scramble to find titles, once paying the

Bank of America The Bank of America Corporation (Bank of America) (often abbreviated BofA or BoA) is an American multinational investment banking, investment bank and financial services holding company headquartered at the Bank of America Corporate Center in ...

$1.3 million for 30 titles in 1953. Only interested in the broadcast rights to the movies for his stations, O'Neil started selling those rights to other TV outlets, a process that he called syndication. O'Neil took General Teleradio into the motion picture studio business because of his constant need for new titles, and that quest took him into nonstop negotiating with

Howard Hughes Howard Robard Hughes Jr. (December 24, 1905 – April 5, 1976) was an American Aerospace engineering, aerospace engineer, business magnate, film producer, and investor. He was The World's Billionaires, one of the richest and most influential peo ...

, the eccentric pilot and entrepreneur, for the purchase of

RKO Radio Pictures RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, is an American film production and distribution company, historically one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Kei ...

, Inc. According to legend, O'Neil haggled with Hughes in taxicabs while driving around Central Park, on cross-country flights flown by Hughes and in Las Vegas until in 1954 the duo signed a contract in the men's room at the

Beverly Hills Hotel The Beverly Hills Hotel, also called the Beverly Hills Hotel and Bungalows, is located on Sunset Boulevard in Beverly Hills, California. One of the world's best-known hotels, it is closely associated with Hollywood film stars, rock stars, and ...

, turning RKO Pictures over to General Teleradio for $25 million, or about $150 million at today's prices. O'Neil changed the studio's name to RKO Teleradio Pictures at first, then eventually to RKO General. The studio library's hundreds of titles solved O'Neil's movie programming problems, and he began diversifying his company into regional airlines as well as resort hotels and Pepsi-Cola bottling franchises. O'Neil retired from RKO General in 1985.

Personal life

O'Neil married Claire McCahey, and they had nine children.

References

External links

Encyclopedia.com

BBC documentary on Howard Hughes includes interviews with Tom O'Neil, Ginger Rogers, and Lucille Ball.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Oneil, Thomas F. 1998 deaths Businesspeople from Kansas City, Missouri College of the Holy Cross alumni Tire industry people 1915 births 20th-century American businesspeople