She was born into poverty in rural Mississippi to a teenage single
mother. She has stated that she was molested during her childhood and
early teens and became pregnant at 14. Sent to live with the man she
calls her father, a barber in Tennessee, Winfrey landed a job in radio
while still in high school. Her emotional ad-lib delivery eventually got
her transferred to the daytime talk show arena. She's thought to have
popularized and revolutionized the tabloid talk show genre pioneered by
Phil Donahue. By the mid-1990s, she had reinvented her show with a focus
on literature, self-improvement, and spirituality. From 2006 to 2008,
her endorsement of Obama, by one estimate, delivered over a million
votes. In 2013, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by
President Barack Obama. The viewership for The Oprah Winfrey Show was
highest during the 1991–92 season, when about 13.1 million U.S. viewers
were watching each day. The power of Winfrey's opinions and endorsement
to influence public opinion has been dubbed "The Oprah Effect".
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