Lloyd Morrisett, Co-Creator of ‘Sesame Street,’ Dead at 93

Sesame Street co-creator Lloyd Morrisett has died. He was 93 years old.

The Sesame Workshop Twitter account announced Morrisett’s death on social media today, writing, “Sesame Workshop mourns the passing of our esteemed and beloved co-founder.”

“A Lifetime Honorary Trustee, Lloyd leaves an outsized and indelible legacy among generations of children the world over, with Sesame Street only the most visible tribute to a lifetime of good work and lasting impact,” they continued.

The statement went on to call Morrisett “a wise, thoughtful, and above all kind leader of the Workshop for decades,” and mentioned his interest in technology and “new ways it could be used to educate.”

It concluded with a message from co-creator Joan Ganz Cooney, who was also Morrisett’s close friend. “Without Lloyd Morrisett, there would be no Sesame Street. It was he who first came up with the notion of using television to teach preschoolers basic skills, such as letters and numbers,” Cooney wrote. “He was a trusted partner and loyal friend to me for over fifty years, and he will be sorely missed.”

Morrisett’s cause of death has not yet been publicly shared.

Morrisett and Cooney co-founded the Children’s Television Workshop in 1968 and created Sesame Street the following year. The duo were inspired by their drive to help prepare disadvantaged children for early education.

Prior to his work with the Children’s Television Workshop, Morrisett worked to support education at Carnegie Corporation and eventually became the vice president of the organization and their foundation dedicated to teaching. He later reflected on how that experience led him to create the beloved children’s program.

“Looking back on it, several different things were going on which led to creating Sesame Street,” Morrisett said in a 2004 interview with The Academy. He mentioned the programs he was funding at Carnegie and said that while they were beneficial, they were only reaching a few hundred children – despite the millions in need of help. “There was a huge gap between what we were doing and what we were trying to achieve,” he said, which ultimately led him to connect with Cooney.

Sesame Street has been nominated for 31 Primetime Emmys, winning 12, in its time on air. The children’s program has been on for 53 seasons and is currently available to watch on HBO Max. Morrisett remained on the board of trustees for Sesame Workshop up until his death.