Written by: Smriti Lama - 25015, Grade X
Posted on: 06 February, 2023
Oprah Winfrey was born on January 29, 1954 in Rural Town of Kosci Mississippi. She is an American talk show host, television producer and an actress. She had great speaking skills and intelligence and these were encouraged by her grandmother and her father. She got a full scholarship to Tennessee State University where she studied communication. At first she worked in a local radio station and later on she moved to a local Nashville station. After that she became the youngest news anchor and the first black female news anchor. After some years she relocated to Illinois and took over hosting duties of AM Chicago. Oprah Winfrey was crowned Miss Black Tennessee in 1972. She stopped doing beauty pageants when her career took off. She started her own production company called Harpo Productions. And in September 2002, Oprah Winfrey was named the first recipient of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Bob Hope Humanitarian Award. The Oprah Winfrey show aired for 25 seasons from 1986 to 2011. In 2011 he launched her own TV network named “The Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN)” which ran for 25 years. With its placement on 120 channels and an audience of 10 million people, the show grossed $125 million by the end of its first year of which Oprah Winfrey received 30 million from.
In 2004 Oprah Winfrey signed a new contract to continue The Oprah Winfrey show. At the same time the syndicated show was seen on nearly 212 U.S. stations and in more than 100 countries worldwide. And in 2009 Oprah Winfrey announced that she would be ending her program when her contract with ABC ended in 2011. After some years Oprah Winfrey contributed immensely to the publishing world by launching her “Oprah’s Book Club'' as part of her talk show. Even after moving onto other projects Oprah Winfrey continued the annual tradition for the 20th edition in 2017 the list was featured on Amazon. After that she became the first celebrity voice behind Alexa. In 1997 Oprah Winfrey introduced "Oprah's Favorite Things'' an annual list of holiday gifts curated by the mogul on her talk show. In 2015, Winfrey bought a 10 percent stake in Weight Watchers (WW). She also became an advisor for the company and secured herself a seat on the board, and she appeared in TV ads as a spokesperson for the company. In 2017 Oprah Winfrey revealed that she had again lost 42 pounds, which she credited to WW. More than two years later she wrote a letter to WW members saying that she was diagnosed with pre-diabetes before her most recent weight loss journey but that her blood pressure and sugar were now under control. In June 2018, Oprah Winfrey agreed to a multi year deal in which she would create original content for Apple.
