John W. Kluge, Founder of Metromedia, Dies at 95

John W. Kluge, who parlayed a small fortune from a Fritos franchise into a multibillion-dollar communications empire that made him one of the richest men in America, died on Sept 7 at a family home in Charlottesville (VA). He was 95.

Kluge was the creator of Metromedia, the nation's first major independent broadcasting entity, a conglomerate that grew to include seven television stations, 14 radio stations, outdoor advertising, the Harlem Globetrotters, the Ice Capades, radio paging and mobile telephones.

He sold the television stations, including WNEW in New York, for more than $2 billion to Rupert Murdoch, who was expanding his communications empire. Kluge's sale of 11 radio stations brought close to $290 million. The outdoor advertising business went for $710 million. The Harlem Globetrotters and the Ice Capades, which together cost the company $6 million, brought $30 million. Critics complained that he had reaped the bonanza after having paid Metromedia's stockholders too little when he took the company private. But Kluge maintained that the value of the company shot up afterward, when the Federal Communications Commission increased the number of television stations a company could own from seven to 12 and ruled that only two cellular telephone systems could operate in a given city. "That changed the price of poker," he said.