Nate Kaplan; Broadcast Writer, Instructor
Nate Kaplan, often called the dean of Los Angeles broadcast writers and an instructor in the USC School of Journalism for 17 years, has died. He was 74.
Kaplan, who won the Radio and Television News Directors Assn.’s first Golden Mike for newswriting in 1950, died Friday in La Costa of cancer.
He wrote features and magazine shows for KNXT’s Ralph Story and helped create the station’s Big News, the country’s first hourlong news broadcast that set a new pattern for news programs.
Born in Chicago and educated at Indiana University, Kaplan wrote for Army newspapers during World War II, and later wrote for the Indianapolis Star.
Survivors include his wife, Elaine; mother, Nettie Kaplan; three brothers, a sister, two daughters and three stepdaughters, and three grandchildren.
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