Patrick McGovern on How He Wants to Be Remembered

IDG’s Founder and Chairman Patrick J. McGovern died on Wednesday at Stanford Hospital in Palo Alto, California. He was 76.

“IDG has lost a true visionary, and the IT community has lost one of its most exceptional citizens,” newly elected IDG board chairman, Walter Boyd said in a statement released yesterday. “Pat’s foremost desire was for IDG to make the world a better place through a medium of information technology.”

The forward-thinking and ever-modest McGovern most likely didn’t spend much time thinking about his legacy. However, in August 2000, McGovern touched on the topic when he spoke with Daniel Morrow, executive director of Computerworld Honors Foundation as part of the Computerworld ‘s “Oral History” project.

Below is a video excerpt from an interview in which McGovern answers this question:

How would you like to be remembered by graduate students who are going to look back on this period from 200 or 300 years from now?

McGovern graduated from MIT in 1959 with a degree in biophysics and joined Computers and Automation — the first U.S. computer magazine — as an associate Editor and became associate publisher.

[Related: IDG Founder and Chairman Patrick J. McGovern Dies at 76]

In 1964, McGovern founded International Data Corporation, now an IDG subsidiary, to provide the industry with timely and reliable statistics on information technology markets. In 1967, McGovern launched Computerworld, a weekly print publication dedicated to keeping computer buyers apprised of industry and product news.

Over a span of 50 years, McGovern oversaw IDG’s launch of more than 300 magazines and newspapers and championed the expansion of IDG’s network to include more than 460 websites, 200 mobile apps and 700 events worldwide.

McGovern is survived by his wife Lore, his son Patrick McGovern and wife Raquel, his daughter Elizabeth McGovern and husband Scott Early, his stepdaughter Michelle Bethel and husband Erik, and his stepdaughter Dina Jackson and husband Edward, as well as nine grandchildren.

Remembrances and condolences can be shared online at www.idg.com or via email at rememberingpatmcgovern@idg.com.

Dan Muse is executive editor of CIO.com. Follow him on Twitter @dmuse. Follow everything from CIO.com on Twitter @CIOonline, on Facebook, and on Google +.