death_place death_date birth_place birth_date article_title name occupation
united states 15 january 2001 united states 16 april 1916 ted mann
 ted mann producer
ted mann

ted mann -lrb- april 16 , 1916 -- january 15 , 2001 -rrb- was an american businessman , involved in the film industry , and head of mann theatres .
he famously changed the name of grauman 's chinese theater to mann 's chinese theater when he purchased the national general theatre chain that owned it in 1973 .
born in wishek , north dakota , mann started off in the movie business as an usher around the time he attended the university of minnesota in the 1930s .
he rented the selby theatre in saint paul , minnesota for $ 100 a month and began to build his own company .
he ran the theater almost completely by himself , expanding to 25 venues within a few years .
mann sold the theaters to general cinema corporation in 1970 and moved to california .
the first production to his credit was 1969 's `` the illustrated man '' , based on a ray bradbury book .
he did n't stay out of the theater business for long , and purchased the troubled 276-screen national general theatre chain in 1973 .
mann soon expanded the chain to 360 screens , but again sold off his theaters in 1986 , this time to gulf + western , which later renamed itself to paramount communications -lrb- which itself became part of viacom -rrb- .
grauman 's theater eventually regained its original name in late 2001 .
both the orpheum and pantages venues of today 's hennepin theatre district in minneapolis were once owned by mann .
he eventually owned at least six theaters in the city 's downtown region .
the ted mann concert hall at the university of minnesota in minneapolis is named for him .
he married actress rhonda fleming in 1977 , and they remained together until mann died at age 84 in los angeles of complications from a stroke .
