NPR Host
Bob Edwards
Notes from Evan Smith
"For so many years, millions of us woke up to the same seven words: This is Morning Edition. I'm Bob Edwards. During the last quarter century, the host of National Public Radio's signature morning show -- the most listened to program on public radio -- was like a literate, always ironic, and sometime goofy friend -- a comforting and familiar voice, someone we felt we knew, and nothing like the people who delivered the news on those other stations. But earlier this year, Edwards was moved out of his chair by NPR, kicked upstairs in a very unpublic radio kind of way, and you could see the handwriting on the wall. Indeed, in late July, it was announced that he would soon host a new morning show on XM Satellite Radio -- if not a competitor to Morning Edition, then a show that likely has a similar flavor and, not incidentally, an overlapping time slot. Quite a turn of events for the Louisville, KY, native, who got his start in radio at a small station in New Albany Indiana and went on to produce and anchor TV and radio news programs for the American Forces Korea Network while serving in Seoul. He joined the NPR staff in 1974 when the microphones were barely turned on, and he'd been there ever since -- conducting, in all, more than 20,000 interviews and winning dozens of awards, including a prestigious George Foster Peabody Award in 1999. This summer he toured the country promoting his new book, Edward R. Murrow and the Birth of Broadcast Journalism, but of course his own career was what everyone wanted to talk about." - Evan Smith, Texas Monthly Talks, Broadcast 8.19.04
