Edward McLaughlin Passes

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Broadcasting visionary Edward McLaughlin passed away Thursday, January 18, at a hospice in Palm Beach, FL. He was 91. Mr. McLaughlin — who was to be honored with the 2018 Lifetime Achievement Award at the Broadcasters Foundation of America’s Golden Mike Award dinner, March 5, in New York City — was the man who launched Rush Limbaugh into syndication.


A radio entrepreneur and pioneer largely responsible for the renaissance of Talk radio, McLaughlin was formerly ABC Radio Network president. He also founded EFM Media Management in 1987 and syndicated The Dr. Dean Edell Show. In addition, he’d served as chairman of the Broadcasters Foundation of America for seven years, and general manager of KGO, San Francisco, a heritage radio station on the West Coast. Over the course of his career, McLaughlin served in a variety of other roles and won many awards.

Richard A. Foreman, prominent station broker and CEO, RAF Media, who was a network colleague, said, “Ed really resurrected network radio in the early 80s. And he moved talk radio to the forefront of an industry populated by stations that resembled jukeboxes with their cacophony of various music formats. He saw that stations could make people think … not just entertain them.”

Mr. McLaughlin is survived by his children Kim, Edward, and Marika.

There will be a private service next week in Greenwich, CT, and a memorial service on a date yet to be announced in June.