User:Eagledj/sandbox/Rod Daniel

Rod Daniel attended high school at Battle Ground Academy in Franklin, Tennessee (near Nashville) and graduated in 1960. He was inducted into the school's Alumni Hall of Fame in 2013. He graduated from Vanderbilt University and briefly attended law school which he decided was not for him. He served in the Vietnam War as a lieutenant of the United States Army. Daniel then got a job in advertising as a producer and director of commercials first in Nashville, then Atlanta and Chicago. He befriended Hugh Wilson, who produced and directed sitcoms. Wilson was creating a new show called WKRP in Cincinnati and invited Daniel to watch the filming of the pilot. Daniel said, "On set, I just instinctively knew how to do what they were doing so I pursued it aggressively". In 1978, he became the director of the show which was the spark for his future career in TV and films. Daniel's father was a surgeon. Rollin A. Daniel Jr. M.D. was Chief of Cardiothoracic Surgery At Vanderbilt University and a founding member of the American Board of Thoracic Surgery. There is presently a yearly guest lectureship at Vanderbilt bearing Dr. Daniel's name.