Thomas Alton Pyle
Motion picture, instructional television and 501©3 executive Thomas Alton Pyle, born in Phoenix, Ariz., Sept. 8, 1933, to Thomas Virgil and Evelyn B. (Redden), died Feb. 20 2011. He married Victoria Bileck (deceased), April 21, 1957. Pyle is survived by his wife Marilyn, daughter, Pamela Pyle, and son, Brett.
Pyle worked in the entertainment industry in many capacities throughout his career.
As a singer, actor and narrator, he appeared in more than 1,500 performances on Broadway, in concerts, opera, stock, clubs, radio and TV throughout the U.S., Canada, Mexico and Cuba, with such notables as Leonard Bernstein, Fred Warring, Robert Shaw, Ralph Hunter from 1949 to 1960. He was under management to Edna and Red Skelton from 1951 to 1955 and National Artists Corp. from 1955 to 1960.
Pyle served as a freelance unit manager, casting director and paymaster in the NYC and LA motion picture industry for all the major studios. He worked for Alfred Hitchcock, Sidney Lumet and Robert Wise on 10 movies with such stars as Cary Grant, Jack Lemon, Paul Newman, Rock Hudson, Joann Woodward, Doris Day, Sophia Loren, Debbie Reynolds and Lana Turner. He was a stunt double for Henry Fonda and double for Edward R. Murrow from 1958 to 1960. In addition, he was commissioned by the National Assoc. of manufacturers in 1962 to develop a motion picture on President John F. Kennedy. In 1965 and 1966, Pyle received two Academy Award nominations for Best Short Subject.
Pyle worked on the business side of the industry from 1960 to 1987 in various positions from producer to president and CEO of the National Science Center Foundation, and served 98 clients of the Fortune 500, producing multi-media presentations.
Education became a major focus as he turned his attention to the Network for Instructional TV, Inc. (NITV), where he was executive director and CEO. From 1987 to 2005, the organization built and operated 88 new educational microwave television channels for K-12 urban centered schools nationally; established Video First as a full-time curriculum-based programming service; started the first high-speed wireless delivery of Internet to urban public schools; launched teachersfirst.com, a free Internet resource site for K-12 teachers; launched teachersandfamilies.com, an Internet subscription service for teachers, parents and students focused on pre-school, gifted and challenged children; launched preschoolfirst.com for parents of children from birth through age 5, for preschool teachers, counselors and pediatricians.
Pyle retired from NITV to open his own consulting firm, New Century Communications, serving educators and corporations in the wireless communications industry. He was an acknowledged authority on increasing productivity through education, training and information relay, and an expert on their effects in the critical national areas of technology, science, communications and defense.
He served on numerous boards of directors, in the instructional television industry and was a member of the New York Academy of Sciences, AASA and the International Platform Association. He is listed in the Who's Who: in America; in the Southwest; in Finance; and in the World. Pyle authored two books: "Silver to Gold," on the growth of educational microwave television in the United States, and his memoir, "An 'Almost Famous,' Non-Compliant Son."
