Bob Edwards
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Bob Edwards (born May 15, 1947) was the original host of Morning Edition on National Public Radio. In a 1999 Peabody Award he was called "a man who embodies the essence of excellence in radio. His reassuring and authoritative voice is often the first many Americans hear each day. His is a rare radio voice: informed but never smug; intimate but never intrusive; opinionated but never dismissive. Mr. Edwards does not merely talk, he listens."
Edwards was born in Louisville, Kentucky.
It was a role he held since the show's inception in 1979, and which he was asked to leave as of April 2004, to stay on at NPR News as a senior correspondent. This decision to remove Bob just shortly before his 25th anniversary with the show was met with much criticism by listeners. His final broadcast (http://www.npr.org/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=3&prgDate=30-Apr-2004) as the host was on April 30, 2004; his last interview on that broadcast was with CBS newsman Charles Osgood, who was also Edwards' first Morning Edition interview subject almost 25 years earlier. Coincidentally, the show also included a segment about the last Oldsmobile, which rolled off an assembly line the day before.
But Edwards' career as a radio show host wouldn't suffer the same fate as the Olds. Three months later, XM Satellite Radio announced that Edwards had signed on to host a new program, The Bob Edwards Show, for its new XM Public Radio channel. The announcement came after Edwards dropped hints that he might move on from NPR while doing interviews to promote his book on Edward R. Murrow. The show's first broadcast was on October 4, 2004; a Washington Post article (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A22089-2004Jul28.html) said Edwards was going to work with former NPR producer Mark Schramm. Among Edwards' first guests was former CBS News anchor Walter Cronkite.
"They want to give me a program, so I can continue to host and be heard every day instead of occasionally, as I would have been at NPR," Edwards told the Post. He said the format would be "loose": "It'll be long interviews, short interviews, and then maybe departments... You've got to have the news... it's not going to be all features, yet it's not going to be the Financial Times, either."
Edwards attended University of Louisville and began his radio career at a small radio station in New Albany, Indiana. Edwards joined NPR in 1974. Before hosting Morning Edition, Edwards was a co-host of All Things Considered.
In 1993, his book Fridays with Red: A Radio Friendship (ISBN 0671870130) was published, based on his Morning Edition segments with Red Barber. He also wrote Edward R. Murrow and the Birth of Broadcast Journalism (ISBN 0471477532), published in 2004.
Edwards is married to Sharon Edwards and has two daughters, Eleanor and Susannah, who are educated at home.
External links
- NPR biography (http://www.npr.org/about/people/bios/bedwards.html)
- Leaving Morning Edition (http://www.npr.org/about/press/040323.bobedwards.html)
- His forced departure from Morning Edition (MSNBC) (http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4586432/)
- Bob Edwards: 30 Years on NPR (http://www.npr.org/about/specials/bedwards/)
- Bob Edwards to host morning show on XM Radio (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A22089-2004Jul28.html) (The Washington Post, 29 Jul. 2004)
- Acclaimed Public Radio Newsman Bob Edwards Joins XM... (http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/040729/dcth039_1.html) (press release)
- XM Public Radio (XM 133) (http://www.xmradio.com/programming/channel_page.jsp?ch=133)