Stanford L. Opotowsky; Newspaper and TV Executive, Author

Stanford L. Opotowsky, 73, author and newspaper and television executive. He began his long career in his teens, writing about youth sports for the Times-Picayune in his native New Orleans. He attended Tulane University and was a Marine combat correspondent in World War II. After running the Sea Coast Echo, a family-owned weekly newspaper in Bay St. Louis, Miss., and working for UPI, Opotowsky joined the New York Post as national reporter in 1955. Among the stories he covered were school integration in Little Rock, Ark., and the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Opotowsky rose to Post managing editor in 1965, a position he held until 1972, when he became director of news coverage for ABC television. He later headed ABC political operations, overseeing voting booth exit polls, and retired in 1992. He wrote several books, among them “The Longs of Louisiana,” “TV: The Big Picture,” “The Kennedy Government” and “Men Behind Bars.” On Wednesday in Orlando, Fla., of cancer.