Danny Villanueva, a former pro football player who became key to the growth of Spanish-language broadcasting in the United States, was known as a gregarious, friendly executive.
Unless his principles were crossed.
In 1968, he was news director of KMEX-TV in Los Angeles when more than 10,000 students walked out of schools in East L.A. to protest the state of conditions there.
Realizing it was a historic moment for the Latino community, Villanueva rushed to a technician and told him to switch from regular programming to a news feed. The technician refused.
"Do it and I'll take responsibility," Villanueva recalled telling the technician in a 1997 interview with The Times.