Born in Kosciusko, Mississippi, From age six to 13, she lived in Milwaukee with her mother. Age of 13, she was sent to Nashville to live with her father, Vernon Winfrey.Oprah Winfrey's broadcasting career began at age 17. In 1976, she moved to Baltimore to join WJZ-TV news as a co-anchor, and in 1978 discovered her talent for hosting talk shows when she became co-host of WJZ-TV's "People Are Talking," while continuing to serve as anchor and news reporter.
America fell in love with Oprah Winfrey, her love of acting and her desire to bring quality entertainment projects into production prompted her to form her own production company, HARPO .
Winfrey launched the Oprah Winfrey Show in 1986 as a nationally syndicated program. 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 Winfrey received $30 million. She soon gained ownership of the program from ABC, drawing it under the control of her new production company, Harpo Productions.
In the wake of her highly publicized success, Winfrey's personal chef, Rosie Daley, and trainer, Bob Greene, both published best-selling books.
The media giant contributed immensely to the publishing world by launching her "Oprah's Book Club," as part of her talk show. The program propelled many unknown authors to the top of the bestseller lists and gave pleasure reading a new kind of popular prominence.
Oprah's Book Club is a book discussion club segment of the American talk show The Oprah Winfrey Show, highlighting books chosen by host Oprah Winfrey. Winfrey started the book club in 1996, selecting a new novel for viewers to read and discuss each month. Because of the book club's wide popularity, many obscure titles have become very popular bestseller, increasing sales in some cases by as many as several million copies; this occurrence is known colloquially as the Oprah effect.In 2007 the club had the honor of being granted Cormac McCarthy's first ever on camera interview.
The book club has also been connected to several well known literary controversies such as Jonathan Franzen's public dissatisfaction with his novel The Corrections having been chosen by Winfrey, and the now infamous incident of James Frey's memoir, A Million Little Pieces, a 2005 selection, being outed as partly fabricated. The latter controversy resulted in Frey and publisher Nan Talese being confronted and publicly shamed by Winfrey in a highly praised live televised episode of Winfrey’s show.
Oprah Winfrey has given back to others. I will be the first to tell you I am not a fan of tv "tell all talk shows" but I do believe Oprah Winfrey has leveraged the popularity of the Oprah Winfrey Show to do many fine charitable projects. For authors of new novels, being listed in the Oprah Book Club is a must for future sales and recognition. Fans of the Oprah Winfrey Show can write Oprah with comments and suggestions for future shows or just for advice, Fans can subscribe to her Oprah magazine and, in my opinion, her top achievement has been the funding, building and opening of Oprah Winfrey's Leadership Academy for Girls, located in South Africa. This is something Oprah Winfrey can and should be very proud of and she deserves much credit for this fine example of giving back to those who have great needs. Although there has been issues with the leadership academy this is the type of giving back that the world needs more of from those who have been tremendously blessed.
Yes, I have to say Oprah Winfrey is America's Best Friend.
