She was the richest African American — male or female– of the 20th century and the first black woman to become a multi-millionaire, but Oprah Winfrey started out in life as just a regular girl from a poor background in Mississippi.
She was born in January 29, 1954 in Kosciusko, Mississippi. Her father, Vernon Winfrey, was a coal miner and a barber. Her mother, Vernita Lee, was a maid. They never married. Oprah Winfrey moved at age six from her grandmother’s Mississippi farm to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, with her mother, and at age fourteen to Nashville, Tennessee, to live with her father.
She excelled in school despite a childhood troubled with rebellion and abuse. She opened a book at an early age, and the book in turn opened a door to life beyond her then-present circumstances.
Oprah received a full college scholarship to Tennessee State University in 1972, and won the Miss Black Tennessee contest when she was eighteen years of age. The next year she began to work as a news anchor in Nashville.
In 1976, after earning her college degree, she moved to a position with an ABC news affiliate in Baltimore, Maryland, and in 1977 began co-hosting a local morning show.Oprah Winfrey was hired in 1984 to rescue a failing morning talk show in Chicago, A. M. Chicago. After a quick turnaround in the ratings, it was expanded to an hour and renamed the next year as The Oprah Winfrey Show, and it was syndicated nationally in 1986 — making Oprah Winfrey the first African American to host a nationally-syndicated talk show.That year, she formed Harpo Productions, a production company.
She acted in or produced a number of movie and television projects. In 2000, she helped found Oxygen Media, Inc., providing cable and interactive programming directed at women.
Oprah’s Book Club, begun in 1997, has been responsible for huge sales of the books that she features on her talk show, with major benefits to the publishing industry and to individual writers.
Along with Whoopi Goldberg, Danny Glover and some other well-known stars, Oprah Winfrey had a major role in The Color Purple, Steven Spielberg’s movie adaptation of Alice Walker’s novel. That year The Lion of Africa, starring Brian Dennehy, took the Oscar for best picture. Many felt The Color Purple was the best picture of the year, and that Oprah’s performance as Sophia was stellar.
Oprah also appeared in a movie adaptation of Richard Wright’s Native Son, and co-starred in the television series The Women of Brewster Place in 1989.
In 1992, she provided the voice of Elizabeth Keckley in the television production, Lincoln.
In 1997, Oprah produced and starred in the television movie Before Women and starred in an adaptation of Toni Morrison’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel, Beloved. She has produced or acted in a number of television and movie productions.
Oprah Winfrey, with the income and wealth derived from her production company and other efforts, donates signficant sums to charities and other philanthropic causes, especially those stressing education. The Oprah’s Angel Network gives $100,000 awards to those who help others in significant ways.
She says her wealth has not changed who she is– it just allows her “to wear better shoes.”
The Advocate salutes this giant of our times, as a true historical figure. She has a number of firsts to her credit:
– first African American syndicated talk show host
– first African American woman billionaire (Forbes, 2003)
– first African American woman to own her own television network
Her empire is extensive and consists of The Oprah Winfrey Show, Harpo Productions, O Magazine, Oxygen Network, Oprah’s Angel Network, and Oprah’s Book Club.
