NBC "Golden Girl" of the 1970s and early 80s who had a career that was marked by accusations that she was promoted based on looks and not substance. Died in an auto accident not long after NBC gave up on her.
Former host of Good Morning, America. Well, we finally got the story down. Born Protestant, she converted to Judaism to marry her husband in a what the newspaper called a "traditional Jewish wedding". (Sushi, shrimp & lobster were served). Joan told all to the tabloid The National Star, which had the picture rights. She was married by Rabbi Marc Gellman, her former news colleague, who is half of the "God Squad" on "GMA".
Host of a late-night show in NYC area for forty five(!) years. Gently satirized by Billy Crystal on SNL. Guests were usually minor-league; with exceptions. "Discovered" Tiny Tim. Still has a radio show. Franklin was the King of nostalgia and a wonderful salesman for "Hoffman" soda and Streits matzo.
Political reporter and weekend anchor for NY One News.
Talk Show host on CNN. Born Larry Zeiger. Raised in Brooklyn.
Liz Claman is co-anchor of CNBCs "Todays Business" and "Market Watch" .Claman had been the regular fill-in co-anchor on "Market Watch" since October 1998, and was named as the permanent co-host in March 1999
Widely syndicated columnist and host of the very successful PBS series "Wall Street Week" (on 30yrs as of this year). His father, Merryle Stanley Rukeyser, was a leading financial writer for decades. (We would love to know the origin of the name "Merryle")
Long time host of Sunday morning news/talk show. Created the "McLaughlin Report" style newstalk show.
Co-host of the "Today" show on NBC. Today had a segment in which many NBC journalists traced their "roots". Lauers family came from Romania to the Lower East Side at the turn of the 19th C. Update: We have a good source that tells us Lauers mother is not Jewish. Apparently the roots tracing only reflected his fathers family.
Host of his own TV talk show. Father is Shirley Povich, famous Washington Post sportswriter often erroneously identified as a woman. We have recently confirmed, through older magazine sources, that Connie Chung did indeed convert to Judaism following her marriage to Maury.
Started as the co-star of the "Today" show. First female network news anchor. Pioneer of soft-ball question celebrity specials. Her father, Lou Walters, owned the famous Latin Quarter nightclub in New York City. A visitor recently questioned whether Ms. Walters was Jewish. Adding that Walters spoke a few Yiddish words on "The View" television program and it came out pretty awful. This made the visitor think Barbara would be happier talking Laotian. This comment made us laugh. But, Yiddish fluency aside, Walters is Jewish and even keeps on marrying Jewish men (three to date).
Radio talk show host in the NY area. Born and raised in N. Carolina. Correction: His show is syndicated nationwide. A moderate conservative. His trademark is speaking a lot of languages. He lost a close race congressional race to Bella Abzug. He startled Chinese-American voters by campaigning in Cantonese.
Radio talk show host in the New York area for many years.
Host of "Politically Incorrect". His father is Irish Catholic and his mother is Jewish. He was raised Catholic. Maher says he feels more "Jewish" than "Irish"--whatever that means. Perhaps James Joyce can explain it.
Actor who had a talk show for several years on CNBC.
Television producer who had an interesting talk show in NYC in the 60s and 70s. Intelligently covered topics few others did.
Talk show host. Orthodox Jew.
Radio Talk Show Host and ex Mayor of New York City
Host of his own cable talk show. Former correspondent for "20/20". Father, non-Jewish Puerto Rican. Mother, Jewish. Geraldo had a bar mitzvah, which he says was a bit odd. (It was a very modest affair and the juxtaposition of the two families was pretty funny). Rivera is also a lawyer, but has not practiced since he went into journalism over twenty-five years ago. He is making serious noises about running for mayor of New York City in 2001. A fun fact is that one of his many ex-father-in-laws is famous novelist Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (who is not Jewish). Vonnegut does not have anything much nice to say about Geraldo. We gather that Geraldo was quite a "rake" in his youth.
Mexicos equivalent of Dan Rather
