Philadelphia ? Walter H. Annenberg, the billionaire philanthropist who made much of his fortune by introducing TV Guide to America’s living rooms during television’s golden age, died Tuesday at 94.

Annenberg was ambassador to Britain under President Nixon, a noted art collector, and a silent power broker in the Republican Party, as well as one of its biggest contributors.

The publishing magnate died at his home in suburban Wynnewood of complications from pneumonia, said Kathleen Hall Jamieson, dean of the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania one of two leading communication schools he endowed.

Forbes magazine listed him as one of the wealthiest Americans, ranking him No. 39 in 2002 with an estimated net worth of $4 billion.

Annenberg inherited The Philadelphia Inquirer and two racing publications from his father in 1942. He went on to build Triangle Publications into a multibillion-dollar business encompassing newspapers, magazines, and radio and TV stations.

“As ambassador to Great Britain, he was an outstanding representative of America to the world,” President Bush said. “As a business leader and an innovator, he understood the media’s impact on American culture and encouraged television to be a positive influence on society.”

Billions to charity

His made billions in charitable donations. In 1991 he donated his $1 billion collection of Impressionist and early modern masterpieces including some of the finest works of van Gogh, Cezanne, Renoir, Manet, Matisse, Gauguin, Degas and Picasso to New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. Museum director Philippe de Montebello pronounced Annenberg “one of the greatest philanthropists in our history.”

Annenberg also donated hundreds of millions to the Universities of Pennsylvania and Southern California, where communications schools were established bearing his name; the United Negro College Fund; the state of Israel; and several hospitals.

In 1993, he announced $500 million in grants for public school reform. Annenberg said he was deeply troubled by violence in American society. “The way I see this tragedy, education is the most wholesome and effective approach,” he said.

Family business

U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain Walter H. Annenberg gestures as he leaves the American Embassy in London en route to Buckingham Palace in this April 29, 1969, file photo.

Walter Hubert Annenberg was born March 13, 1908, in Milwaukee, to Moses and Sadie Annenberg. Moses Annenberg began to build his empire while his son was a boy in Chicago. The family moved to Philadelphia when the elder Annenberg bought the Inquirer.

But Moses Annenberg fell afoul of tax laws and was sentenced in 1940 to three years for tax evasion. He was released for treatment of a brain tumor and died in 1942.

Walter Annenberg later added the Philadelphia Daily News to his newspaper properties. In 1944 he founded Seventeen, the fashion and beauty magazine for teenage girls. It was edited by his sister, Enid Haupt.

In 1953, he saw the rapid growth of television and established TV Guide as a national publication. It grew to a circulation of more than 14 million.

Eventually his Triangle Publications acquired six radio and six television stations in Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut and California, and a broadcasting network.

He sold the two Philadelphia dailies to Knight Newspapers for $55 million in 1970, and a year later, for millions more, sold his radio and TV stations. In 1988 he sold all the remaining Triangle properties, including TV Guide, to magnate Rupert Murdoch for $3 billion.

Home and abroad

His appointment as ambassador to England in 1969 raised controversy because of his lack of foreign affairs experience. But he and his wife, Leonore, wound up charming British society during their 5 1/2 years there.

“Practically everybody who has so far met the Annenbergs here in sharp contrast to those who have read sour comments on their riches carries away vivid impressions of warmth, generosity and a robust love of all things English,” one English columnist wrote.

The publishing magnate routinely hosted politicians, royalty and other luminaries at his estate in Rancho Mirage, Calif., including President Reagan, who awarded Annenberg the Medal of Freedom in 1986.