Oprah Gail Winfrey is a world-known American television personality, actress, and entrepreneur who was born on 29 January, 1954 in Kosciusko, Mississippi, United State. She completed her schooling from Lincoln High School in Milwaukee but after early success in the Upward bound programme she was transferred to the affluent suburban Nicolet High School.She was the most popular and highest paid show host of the syndicated daily talk show, “The Oprah Winfrey”. Winfrey was the first Black American woman to own her own production company, which she started by the name of Harpo Productions which was just the backward spelling of her name.
Winfrey was one of the richest and most influential women in the United States at a time. She was born into poverty in rural Mississippi to a single teenage mother but later moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, at age six to live with her mother. When she was a teenager she was sent to Nashville to live with her father, who proved to be a positive influence in her life. At age 19 Winfrey got placed as a news anchor for the local CBS television station. She completed her graduation from Tennessee State University in 1976 and got a job as a reporter and co-anchor for the ABC News affiliate in Baltimore, Maryland and later in 1977 she got the post of the co-host of the Baltimore morning show, People Are Talking.
Winfrey started her own television production house, Harpo Productions, Inc., in 1986, and a film production company, Harpo Films, in 1990. The companies began buying film rights to literary works, including Connie May Fowler’s Before Women Had Wings, which appeared in 1997 with Winfrey, and Toni Morrison’s Beloved, which appeared in 1998. And later in 2010 Oprah Winfrey was named a Kennedy Center honoree. She was also awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. She won the Cecil B. DeMille Award in 2018. She has won numerous Emmy Awards for The Oprah Winfrey Show and other television work.
Ava DuVernay and Oprah Winfrey, who together made the OWN series “Queen Sugar” a launching pad for female directors, were both recognised at the Variety Power of Women event. For “establishing the OWN network” and “reflecting black families,” Winfrey praised “Queen Sugar.” In a recent speech for Variety’s Power of Women, Winfrey said, “We are all looking for the same thing. This is the one lesson I came away from doing The Oprah Winfrey Show. The common denominator of our experiences is that we all want to know that we matter and we want a show that reflects our values.”
Oprah Winfrey believes,”Passion is energy. Feel the power that comes from focusing on what excites you.” She also took part in a variety of charity endeavors, including the global nonprofit organization Oprah’s Angel Network. She inaugurated a $40 million South African school for underprivileged girls in 2007. She has developed into a vocal opponent of child abuse.
