Doris Ann Scharfenberg, who paved the way for women when she began working as a television producer for NBC in the 1950s, died Jan. 4 in Ft. Worth, Texas. She was 91.
Scharfenberg left New York and moved to Fort Worth to be near friends after retiring from NBC in 1980, ending an award-winning three-decade career.
She grew up in New Jersey, graduated from Bucknell University with degrees in psychology and sociology in 1938, and eventually began working in the personnel department at NBC. She was promoted to produce religious programming in 1951: The Catholic Hour and Frontiers of Faith for Christian viewers, and The Eternal Light for Jewish viewers.
She also produced documentaries in Moscow and Hong Kong for the Fort Worth-based Southern Baptist Radio and Television Commission. She collaborated with Baptists for programs set in Israel and traveled to Brazil to televise a Billy Graham program there. She went to Rome to supervise NBC’s broadcast of Midnight Mass from the Vatican.
Among her awards was a 1973 Emmy for outstanding achievement in religious programming for “Duty Bound,” a one-hour special in which she was executive producer.
— Associated Press
