Friends of Lee D. O’Brien, the former SIUC Broadcasting Services director who died last week, say O’Brien made education through broadcasting his life’s work.

Robert Gerig, acting director of Broadcasting and manager of WSIU television, said O’Brien was dedicated to education and strove to utilize television and radio technology as a teaching tool.

He was very active, very interested in public broadcasting and concerned about the educational opportunities it offered, Gerig said.

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Gerig said O’Brien was working on grant writing proposals for distance learning, an educational program using television and fiber-optic telephone technology that provides educational resources to hospitals and schools.

He was a visionary, working to prepare broadcasting for the twenty-first century, he said. Technology is such that computers and television are merging to create a myriad of opportunities O’Brien wanted used for learning, not just a wasteland of entertainment. He felt telephone technology and television were the future of education and worked toward that until the very end.

O’Brien, who lived in Carterville, is survived by his wife Ila and four children, Thomas, Kathy, Julie and Mary.

He was very interested in watching his four kids grow up, very proud of their accomplishments, Gerig said. He was very proud of his wife, who was working on an advanced degree at SIUC.

O’Brien worked at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, first in production, then as manager of the Center for Television Production and Educational Communications before coming to SIUC.

While living in Wisconsin, O’Brien produced a documentary on the Green Bay Packers shown nationally on PBS, Gerig said.

He was the Packers’ number one fan, Gerig said.

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O’Brien served as executive director of the SIUC Broadcasting Service from 1986-1995, and during that time directed WSIU and WUSI public television and WSIU public radio. He began a new public radio station in Olney in 1992.

In 1993, O’Brien received the 21st Century Award, in recognition of public service, expertise in station planning and overall vision.

Gerig said O’Brien was diagnosed with cancer in May. O’Brien died Thursday in Carbondale Memorial Hospital. Funeral services will be held at 10 a.m. today, at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, 403 W. Mill St., in Carbondale. Burial will be at the Shrine of the Good Shepherd in Green Bay, Wis.