Jimmy Brown

News Obituary Article

TALLAHASSEE: Jimmy Brown, Ted Turner mentor

By KAY POWELL

Jimmy Brown, who media mogul Ted Turner called his second father, died of a heart attack at his Tallahassee residence Sunday.

Mr. Brown helped rear Mr. Turner from the age of 9 and remained a friend for life. He was best man at Mr. Turner's 1991 marriage to actress Jane Fonda. As Turner family affairs manager, he was houseman at Mr. Turner's North Florida plantation, Avalon, and spent time at Mr. Turner's Montana ranch.

The funeral Mass for Mr. Brown, 79, also of Fulton County, is 11 a.m. Friday at Welaunee Missionary Baptist Church in Lamont, Fla. The graveside service is 1 p.m. Saturday at Laurel Grove Cemetery in Savannah. Beggs Funeral Home in Monticello, Fla., is in charge of arrangements.

"He was my best friend and mentor," said Mr. Turner, chairman of Turner Enterprises and founder of CNN. "He helped raise me and was a second father to me and was like a second father to my children."

Mr. Brown went to work for Mr. Turner's family when they moved to Savannah. It was Mr. Brown who first took Mr. Turner, an America's Cup winner, sailing. They sailed thousands of miles together, including a trans-Atlantic voyage, said Mr. Turner.

"I learned a lot about tolerance and integration and segregation and race relations from Jimmy," he said. "He was a very intelligent person, a kind and wonderful person, a forgiving person. He was an inspiration to me and will be until the day I die."

Mr. Brown, in an April 1994 Jet Magazine profile, said, "I was brought up in the old school. Hard work, good manners and faith in God."

Survivors include a brother, John M. Brown of Colorado Springs, Colo.

© 2003 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution