Ron Sheldon was born the second of three children on October 27, 1944 to Harold and Nancy Louise Sheldon in Montgomery, Alabama. The Sheldon family including Fredrick, Ronald, and Sharon Elizabeth settled in Austin, Texas in 1957.
Ron Sheldon became interested in television while attending Austin High School. He worked for KLRU (then KLRN) while attending the University of Texas. He also worked at several television stations in Central Texas, Corpus Christi, and San Antonio. In 1965, he took a big leap to follow his dream and moved to Los Angeles, California where he was one of five selected out of 400 applicants for camera positions at NBC. For the next decade of his life, Ron covered all types of events: Super Bowl, Rose Bowl, Bob Hope Golf Classic, Baseball World Series, opening and closing ceremonies at the Atlanta Olympics, the pilot for NBC's daytime drama Days of Our Lives, The Dean Martin Show, The Andy Williams Show, Laugh-In, The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, and the 1968 political conventions.
In 1975, Ron left NBC to freelance and moved back to Central Texas with his wife, Sharon, and his two daughters, Kirsten and Nancy. He traveled the world following his dream working on specials: Elvis Presley Concert Special Aloha from Hawaii, Guinness Book of World Records, Neil Diamond Special, Willie Nelson New Year's Eve Party for HBO, John Denver Special, Garth Brooks Concert, Paul Simon Concert, and Diana Ross Concert all in Central Park.
Ron has garnered 32 Emmy nominations and awarded 7 Emmy's over his 40 year career. He was a member of the Screen Actors Guild and Directors Guild of America. He set the bar for firsts in the television industry by creating, building, and using a 40 foot crane and a mini crane which is still used today. He owned and operated a boating business, Lolita Marine, in Lolita, Texas. He built, staffed, operated, and managed a television station in Victoria, Texas which later became an NBC local affiliate.
In 1987, Ron returned to Austin with his wife, Sharon, and their two daughters, Kirsten and Nancy. He continued working on projects, building cranes for cameras, and coming up with creative ways to use them. A crane he developed is being used by a church in Houston and the mini crane is being used in operating rooms to record, document, and instruct for new procedures. In 2000, Ron and Sharon retired to Bastrop County where he continued working on projects in his custom built shop.
