Oprah Gail Winfrey is one of the most influential figures in American television history, best known as the host of The Oprah Winfrey Show, one of the most-watched talk shows of all time. She is an African American billionaire, philanthropist, actress, and media mogul whose impact extends far beyond television.

Born on January 29, 1954, in Kosciusko, Mississippi, United States, Oprah Winfrey was the daughter of an unmarried young couple belonging to the Baptist faith. At birth, she was named Orpah, after a biblical figure, but her name was later changed to Oprah. Her mother, Vernita Lee, worked as a domestic servant, while her father, Vernon Winfrey, was a miner who later became a barber and eventually served as a municipal council member. At the time of Oprah’s birth, her father was also a member of the armed forces.

After her birth, Oprah’s mother moved north, leaving her to spend the first six years of her life in rural poverty with her grandmother, Anita Mae. Her grandmother taught her to read at the age of three and regularly took her to the local church. Despite her young age, Oprah could recite Bible verses from memory and became known by the nickname “the preacher.”

At the age of six, Oprah moved to Milwaukee with her mother and lived in a poor neighborhood. During this period, she suffered sexual abuse by her cousin, uncle, and a family friend. Despite the unhealthy home environment, she skipped the second and eighth grades without formal attendance and, by the age of thirteen, earned a scholarship to attend a prestigious high school in a suburban area primarily attended by white students.

Although academically successful, Oprah displayed a rebellious attitude and ran away from home several times. Eventually, at the age of fourteen, her mother sent her to live with her strict yet encouraging father, Vernon Winfrey, in Nashville, Tennessee. Under his guidance, Oprah’s education became a central focus of her life.

Graduating from high school with honors, joining the debate team, and winning second place nationally in dramatic interpretation, Oprah later won another speech competition. In 1971, she received a full scholarship to the historically Black institution Tennessee State University. There, she studied communications and, at the age of eighteen, won the Miss Black Tennessee Beauty Pageant.

According to her grandmother, Oprah would create dolls from corn cobs in her youth and hold imaginary conversations with the crows perched on the fence surrounding the family land, demonstrating her natural inclination toward storytelling and performance from an early age.

Oprah’s real media career began when she was only seventeen, while studying at Tennessee State University, by working at a local radio station. While working in local media, she became Nashville’s first African American female news anchor at WTVD-TV. In 1976, she moved to Baltimore to work as a co-anchor for the six o’clock news on WJZ-TV.

On August 14, 1978, Oprah joined the talk show People Are Talking on WJZ-TV as a co-host alongside Richard Sher, while also hosting Dialing for Dollars. In 1983, she relocated to Chicago to host a low-rated, half-hour morning talk show titled A.M. Chicago. After taking over, she transformed the program within months from one of the lowest-rated shows into Chicago’s most-watched television program, surpassing Phil Donahue.

Her growing national success led to a role in The Color Purple (1985), directed by Steven Spielberg, which earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. Following this achievement, her show expanded nationally on September 8, 1986, airing for a full hour on 120 channels under the new title The Oprah Winfrey Show.

Already surpassing Donahue at the local level, Oprah quickly doubled her national audience, making her show the number one daytime television program in the United States. Time Magazine wrote that very few people could have predicted how rapidly Oprah Winfrey would rise to become the most popular talk show host in the country.

The magazine noted that, in a field dominated by white men, Oprah—an outspoken, plus-sized Black woman—compensated for perceived journalistic shortcomings with candor, humor, and sincere empathy. Guests often became emotionally vulnerable, sharing deeply personal secrets, leading critics to liken her show to a group therapy session.

Les Payne of Newsday described Oprah Winfrey as smarter, warmer, and far more in tune with her audience—and perhaps the world—than Phil Donahue. Later, Oprah purchased the rights to her show from ABC and transferred control to her own production company, Harpo Productions. In 1994, at a time when talk shows were losing appeal, she regained audience respect by avoiding sensational headlines and refocusing her content.

Productions under Harpo Productions included the 1989 television series The Women of Brewster Place, in which Oprah also starred. She later partnered with Disney to adapt Toni Morrison’s Pulitzer Prize–winning novel into the 1998 film Beloved, co-starring Danny Glover, though the project did not achieve the expected success.

Widely known for her struggles and successes with weight loss, Oprah famously lost approximately 45 kilograms and competed in the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington, D.C., in 1995. This achievement contributed to best-selling books by her personal chef Rosie Daley and trainer Bob Greene.

Through the addition of Oprah’s Book Club to her show, Oprah introduced books by relatively unknown authors, frequently turning them into bestsellers and making a significant contribution to the publishing industry. In 1999, she co-founded Oxygen Media, a cable and internet-based company producing content for women.

In 2000, the first issue of The Oprah Magazine, also known as “O,” was published. By 2004, The Oprah Winfrey Show was airing on 212 American channels and more than 100 international networks, with contracts extending through the 2010–2011 season.

Named by Life Magazine as the most inspiring woman of her generation, Oprah was also recognized by BusinessWeek in 2005 as the most philanthropic African American woman in U.S. history. Through her charity Oprah’s Angel Network, she raised over $51,000,000 for causes including education for girls in South Africa and relief for victims of Hurricane Katrina.

A leading advocate for children’s rights, Oprah persuaded President Bill Clinton in 1994 to sign legislation requiring a national database of convicted child abusers. She also founded Families for Better Lives and, in 2002, became the first recipient of the Bob Hope Humanitarian Award from The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences.

Winner of numerous Emmy Awards, an Academy Award–nominated actress, influential book critic, and publisher of a high-circulation magazine, Oprah Winfrey was named by Forbes Magazine as the richest African American of the 20th century and, as of 2004, the world’s only Black billionaire in U.S. dollar terms. Since 1992, she has been engaged to public relations executive Stedman Graham. The couple resides in Chicago and owns homes in Montecito, California; Rolling Prairie, Indiana; and Telluride, Colorado.

Source: Biyografiler.com