Syd, a longtime publisher and owner of Variety and Daily Variety, died Aug. 27, 2017, of a sudden illness. He prepared for Princeton at the Manlius School, majored in politics, wrote his senior thesis on “Television and Politics,” and was secretary of the Princeton Sports Car Club — an avocation that he pursued passionately for the rest of his life. Even as an undergraduate, Syd worked for Variety during the school year and in the summers, traveling to New York on Tuesday nights for press closing and printing. He took over the business in 1957 after service as a second lieutenant in the Army. In his three-decade career with the publication, he maintained its reputation as “the bible of show business.”
After selling the publications to Cahners Publishing, Syd focused on collecting and driving vintage cars and participating in historic auto racing. He was an owner and investor in the Sportscar Vintage Racing Association and developed the successful Vintage Motorsport magazine.
Syd married his first wife, Jan McNally, in June 1954. Jan died of emphysema in 1997. In 1999 he married Joan Hoffman, whose husband had died two months before Jan. Syd and Jan had four children and eight grandchildren.
Undergraduate Class of 1954
