Arthur L. Singer Jr., who became an unheralded father of public television in the late 1960s after commercial networks were famously accused of broadcasting a “vast wasteland” of programs, died on Dec. 25. He played a key behind-the-scenes role in the Carnegie Commission report that led to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and federal funding. Singer was said to have been instrumental in galvanizing federal officials, philanthropies and academics to seed the public airwaves with quality programming and to finance future development. He was 90.
