Ian G. Rae
Born in Sydney, Australia, in 1936, Ian G. Rae has been a professional journalist since adolescence.
After training as a cub reporter at an afternoon daily newspaper, The Sydney Sun, in 1952 Rae worked for the Daily Mirror in Sydney.
He first came to the united states in 1961 as a New York- based foreign correspondent for r. Rupert Murdoch’s Australian newspapers and stayed in Gotham until 1965. His last New York assignment, before leaving for the United Kingdom, was as reporter and rewrite man for Heart Newspapers’ New York Journal American. During his first four years in the United States Rae covered everything from the first Australian challenge to the America’s Cup to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, civil rights strife, and the beginning of domestic opposition to the American buildup in Vietnam.
In 1965 Rae relocated to the United Kingdom to work both as a foreign correspondent for Murdoch newspapers and as a reporter for the British national newspaper, The Daily Mail. His beat ranged from the widely publicized ‘murder on the moors’ to the Beatles.
Rae returned to Australia in 1966 to work for Mr. Rupert Murdoch’s Australian magazine company, The Southtown Press, as editor of TV Week, the national’s largest circulation publication about television. In 1969 he was promoted to Editorial Director of The Southtown Press, whose publications included some of Australia’s best selling magazines in their categories.
Rae returned to New York in 1977 and was appointed Editor and Publisher of The Star that year and is given credit for turning the paper into one of America’s most successful supermarket tabloids.
He made the move from print to television in 1986 to develop the nationally syndicated news magazine, “A Current Affair,” ()of which he was named executive producer for Fox Television, which Mr. Murdoch had created that year through his purchases of Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation and the Metromedia Television Stations. The first and most successful of the newsmagazine series, “A Current Affair” has consistently finished among the top 5 nationally syndicated firstrun programs since its 1988 debut in national syndication. Later in 1986 he was named to the additional post of Vice President News Director, at Fox flagship WNYW Channel 5, New York. Under Rae’s leadership WNYW continued its dominance in the weekday 10 pm news race increasing ts ratings in the wake of new challenges from independents WWOR and WPIX. He also found time to fund additional programming assignments from Fox including development of the weekly documentary news magazine series, “The Reporters.”
In 1988 as Fox Television Stations news efforts expanded, Rae added to his existing assignments that of Executive Vice President, News, Fox Television Stations, Inc. In that role he has been instrumental in the growth of news programming at the Fox-owned stations, oversaw the development of Fox Feed, the Fox-owned stations’ nightly satellite news exchange, and assisted in the development of the nationwide satellite-distributed News Service.
Rae is father of five children, Nicholas, Andrew, Simon, Michael and Catherine.
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