Ron Handberg

Inducted 2008

Ron Handberg is that rare journalist who found his way to the top and never lost sight of the powerful relationship a television station can have with its community. Under his leadership, WCCO TV created the region’s largest investigative journalism unit and launched such award-winning mainstays as the I-Team and Dimension features as well as the Moore Report documentaries.

Handberg graduated from the University of Minnesota School of Journalism and began his broadcast career in 1960 as a news writer and reporter for WCCO Radio. He moved to WCCO TV in 1964 and by 1971 had become its Director of News and Public Affairs, later rising to Vice President and General Manager. He also served as WCCO’s on-air editorial voice. Thanks to his strong commitment to journalistic ethics and to innovative, high quality news and public affairs programming, the station won five national Emmy Awards, five Peabody Awards, and numerous other honors during his tenure, while producing journalists that went on to jobs with all the major networks. He left in 1989 but returned to television in 1993 to help launch the award-winning NewsNight Minnesota at TPT. He is also the author of four mystery novels, each drawn from his background in investigative journalism.