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Quinn Martin (May 22, 1922 – September 5, 1987) was one of the most successful American television producers. He had at least one television series running in prime time for 21 straight years (from 1959 to 1980), an industry record.
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He was born in New York City as Irwin Martin Cohn, the second of two children. His father Martin G. Cohn was a film editor and producer at MGM; his mother was Anna Cohn. From age four he was raised in Los Angeles. He graduated from Fairfax High School. He served five years in the U.S. Army during World War II, enlisting in the Signal Corps at Fort MacArthur in San Pedro, California on September 10, 1940. He achieved the rank of sergeant. He would change his name to Quinn Martin (the Quinn came from the pronunciation his friends gave of Cohn, as "Co-Inn").
While attending the University of California, Berkeley and majored in English but did not graduate. Martin started his career in television as a film editor at MGM and also worked as manager of post production for various organizations including Universal Studios (1950–1954), but by the mid-1950s had become an executive producer for Desilu Studios. His first wife, Madelyn Pugh Davis, was one half of the writing team behind Desilu's classic, I Love Lucy. During 1959, he produced for Desilu Productions a two part special that appeared in season 1 of Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse that became a weekly television show The Untouchables that would go on to win Emmy Awards.
In 1960, Martin established his own production company, QM Productions. He sold it in 1978 and worked as an adjunct professor at the University of California, San Diego's Warren College, where he also endowed a chair in drama. He also established a scholarship for theater arts and communications students at Santa Clara University
QM Productions produced a string of successful television series during the 1960s and 1970s, including The Fugitive, Twelve O'Clock High, The F.B.I., The Invaders, The Streets of San Francisco, Cannon, and Barnaby Jones. Besides producing sixteen one-hour television network series, he also produced twenty TV movies, including Attack on Terror, Brinks: The Great Robbery, Face of Fear, House on Greenapple Road, and Murder of Mercy. His only venture into the world of cinema was The Mephisto Waltz, released by Twentieth Century-Fox.
During 1979, a group of investors purchased his wholly owned QM Productions and sold it subsequently to Taft Broadcasting (despite this, his series never gained animated spin-offs, probably due to content), which itself has since changed ownership, from Worldvision Enterprises to Republic Pictures. Nowadays, Republic and CBS Television Studios own ancillary rights to all of QM's library except Twelve O'Clock High (owned by 20th Television), Banyon and The F.B.I. (the latter two of which are owned by both the Martin estate and Warner Bros. Television), with CBS Television Distribution handling TV distribution and Paramount Home Entertainment/CBS DVD handling DVD distribution.
After selling QM Productions he moved to Rancho Santa Fe, California where he became president of the La Jolla Playhouse and the Del Mar Fair Board. He was also involved with business activities developing motion pictures for Warner Bros. with a new company, QM Communications.
A fan of thoroughbred horse racing, Martin owned several racehorses alone and in partnerships. Among his racing wins were the 1975 and 1978 editions of the Carleton F. Burke Handicap at Santa Anita Park.
Quinn Martin died of heart failure on September 5, 1987 in his home in Rancho Santa Fe, aged 65.
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