William Samuel Paley (September 28, 1901 – October 26, 1990)[1] was an American businessman, primarily involved in the media, and best known as the chief executive who built the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) from a small radio network into one of the foremost radio and television network operations in the United States.

[4] William Paley matriculated at Western Military Academy in Alton, Illinois but later transferred to, and recorded his degree from, the University of Pennsylvania, where he was a member of the Theta chapter of Zeta Beta Tau fraternity.

[6] Samuel Paley's intention was to use his acquisition as an advertising medium for promoting the family's cigar business, which included the La Palina brand.

Within a year, under William's leadership, cigar sales had more than doubled, and, in 1928, the Paley family secured majority ownership of the network from their partners.

[citation needed] Paley quickly grasped the earnings potential of radio and recognized that good programming was the key to selling advertising time and, in turn, bringing in profits to the network and to affiliate owners.

Paley's recognition of how to harness the potential reach of broadcasting was the key to his growing CBS from a tiny chain of stations into what was eventually one of the world's dominant communication empires.

During his prime, Paley was described as having an uncanny sense for popular taste[7] and exploiting that insight to build the CBS network.

As early as 1940 Paley envisioned the creation of a network division within CBS tasked with serving much of South America.

In collaboration with his news director Paul White and his director of short wave operations Edmund Chester, Paley laid the foundation for a chain of sixty-four stations in eighteen countries which would subsequently be known as La Cadena de las Americas (The Network of the Americas).

[8] By 1942, Paley's innovative network was broadcasting both news and cultural programming live from CBS in New York City in cooperation with the government's Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs under the direction of a young Nelson Rockefeller.

[9] During World War II, these broadcasts played a central role in promoting cultural diplomacy and Pan Americanism as part of President Franklin Roosevelt's Good Neighbor Policy.

[10][11] [12] In 1943, he and Chester were awarded the Carlos Manuel de Cespedes National Order of Merit by the Cuban government in recognition of his efforts to foster greater understanding between the peoples of Cuba and the United States of America, in recognition of services performed by the Columbia Broadcasting System's Latin-American shortwave radio network.

[17] PAL or Phase Alternating Line, an analogue TV-encoding system, is today a television-broadcasting standard used in large parts of the world.

"Bill Paley erected two towers of power: one for entertainment and one for news," 60 Minutes creator Don Hewitt claimed in his autobiography, Tell Me a Story.

In 1955, Alcoa withdrew its sponsorship of See It Now, and eventually the program's weekly broadcast on Tuesdays was stopped, though it continued as a series of special segments until 1958.

In 1972, Paley ordered the shortening of a second installment of a two-part CBS Evening News series on the Watergate scandal, based on a complaint by Charles Colson, an aide to President Richard Nixon.

And later, Paley briefly ordered the suspension of instant and often negatively critical analyses by CBS news commentators which followed presidential addresses.

Paley's collection included works by Cezanne, Matisse, Picasso, Toulouse-Lautrec, Degas, Derain, Bonnard, Gauguin, and Rouault.

[18] He acquired Picasso's Boy Leading a Horse in 1936 and donated it to the MoMA in 1964[19] however its Nazi-era provenance turned out to be problematic and resulted in a claim for restitution filed by the heirs of Paul von Mendelssohn-Bartholdy who said it had been sold under duress.

In 1973, Paley sold the team at its low ebb for $8.7 million to Cleveland shipbuilder George Steinbrenner and a group of investors.

[34] Dorothy called on her extensive social connections acquired during her previous marriage to introduce Paley to several top members of President Franklin Roosevelt's government.

William and Babe Paley, in spite of their successes and social standing, were barred from being members of country clubs on Long Island because he was Jewish.