South Bend - E. Berry Smith, a longtime executive for Schurz Communications Inc., parent company of WSBT and the South Bend Tribune, has died. He was 82.
Smith died Tuesday of natural causes at Southfield Village nursing home, said Leo Sobieralski, manager of the St. Joseph Funeral Home.
Smith was senior vice president of broadcasting for Schurz Communications from 1988 until he retired in 2000. Before that, he served from 1981-88 as general manager of the WSBT Stations, which include a television station and AM and FM radio stations.
"Berry was an exceptional leader. He was respected not only by local people at the stations here, but by other broadcasters," said Franklin D. Schurz, chairman of Schurz Communications Inc.
Smith started his career at radio station WIRE in Indianapolis in 1949 and was later director of advertising at Franklin Finance in Hartford City. He also worked for CBS Network Sales in Detroit; was vice president and general manager at WFIE-TV, Evansville, Ind.; vice president and general manager at WFTV-TV, Green Bay, Wis.; vice president and general manager, WLKY-TV, Louisville, Ky.; and president and general manager, WTVW-TV, Evansville.
Smith also was a member of the Indiana Broadcast Hall of Fame, a director and chairman of the CBS Television Advisory Board, president of the Indiana Broadcasters Association, president of the Southwest Indiana Broadcasters Association and a member of the Broadcaster's Foundation.
In 1993, Smith was made Sagamore of the Wabash by then-Gov. Evan Bayh.
Smith was born in 1926 in Daytona Beach, Fla., and raised in Indianapolis. He enlisted in the Army and graduated from Butler University in 1949. He married Mary Terese Hoffmann in 1948. She died in 1989.
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