From Radio Shock Jock to Television Icon: Wendy Williams' Journey

just wanted to tell you about her background and where she came from and all that stuff , how she rose to fame . Wendy Williams Hunter and William John Williams born . Oh my gosh , that's not right . Wendy Joan Williams . I'm sorry , why does it have two different names ? I don't know . She is an American former broadcaster , media personality and writer .

Prior to television , williams was a radio DJ and host and quickly became known as New York City's as a shock jock . She gained notoriety for her on-air spats with celebrities and was the subject

I'm sorry for her on-air spats with celebrities and was the subject of the 2006 VH1 reality television series , the Wendy Williams Experience , which broadcasted events surrounding her radio show . From 2008 to 2021 , she hosted the nationally syndicated television talk show , the Wendy Williams Show . She was born in 1964 , puts her age at 60 , birthdays July 18th .

She was born Joan . I'm sorry . Wendy Joan Williams . She was married once . I'm sorry , she was married twice . She has one son . She is married once I'm sorry . She was married twice . She has one son . She is now single .

William's other endeavors include authoring several books , which I guess I'm going to have to go get now , appearances in various films and television shows , touring her comedy show I did not know she did that and her own product lines include a fashion line , a jewelry collection and , of course , a wig line . I went to try to look up this wig line .

You can find kind of where they carried it , but I don't know if you can buy them anymore . I'm not sure . I have not been able to look that up Because you know I'd buy one . Williams was inducted get this into the National Radio Hall of Fame in 2009 .

On her 50th birthday , the Council of Asbury Park , new York , renamed the street on which she grew up Wendy Williams Way . In 2023 , williams retired from broadcasting after being diagnosed with aphasia and frontal temporal dementia . I think that's the same thing that Bruce Willis has . I don't know if that's true or not .

You know there's a debate about that out there . Her early life Wendy Joan Williams was born . I already said all that . Let's see . She was born to Shirley and Thomas Dwayne Williams . The couple had a combined three master's degree . So this woman , she is smart , she

comes from a smart family . Shirley was a special education teacher , while Thomas was a teacher and school principal in 1969 , became the first black school administrator in Red Bank , new Jersey . Following race riots in Asbury Park in 1970 , the family moved to the predominantly white middle-income suburb of Wayside in Oceantown , new Jersey . How about that ?

Isn't that interesting ? You do well for yourself , you get yourself educated , you do well in life . You move out of an area that you don't want to be in anymore because of crime or the way things are , this racial riots that are going on , and you move to a better neighborhood . How about that ? Nothing wrong with that , uh , let's see .

But it was happened to be predominantly white , middle-income suburb , and let's see . She attended a baptist church and visited the town of oak bluffs , massachusetts , each summer as a child . Doctors recommended williams be medicated to control her hyperactivity . She suffered from poor body image due to the diet her parents put her on .

After gaining weight in elementary school , williams was a brownie and in the Girl Scouts and volunteered as a candy striper . Her parents believed she would become a nurse . Obviously she did not pick that road for her . Williams acted as an announcer of her young brother's Little League baseball game . That's probably how she got her start in broadcasting .

She probably liked the sound of her voice being broadcast over air . She graduated from Ocean Township High School in 1982 among four black students , ranking 360th in the class of 363 . Come on now .

Her academic performance con contrasted with her with that of her older sister , who received a university scholarship at the age of 16 , as she was able to use white diction instead of African American . This is from Wikipedia . Okay , I'm not saying this . William's white classmates considered her one of their own and freely used the word the N word around her .

She did not get along with the other black students and said their only commonality was smoking cannabis . Okay , wendy . According to Williams , she did not listen to hip-hop music and instead listened to rock bands like ACDC . I knew I loved her for a reason because they were popular with her classmates .

Due to her suburban upbringing , williams considered herself a multicultural woman who happened to be Black . This is all according to Wikipedia . Now , all right , so let's skip on to she attended Northeastern University .

She got her bachelor's degree of arts , degree in communications and , to appease her parents , a minor in journalism because her parents were not happy with the road avenue that Wendy picked . They wanted her to be a nurse . She's like nope , I'm going into radio and broadcasting . Uh , let's see 1986 and 1994

, her career beginnings . Uh , she worked at radio stations . Two weeks after graduating from Northeastern , williams began her career as a disc jockey , working in the small calypso and reggae-oriented WVIS in Frederiksted in the Virgin Islands . Interesting , but disliked the role because she did not learn as much about radio from her colleagues as she expected .

Due to the low pay and isolation from her family , williams began sending resumes and demo tapes of herself to other radio stations . She left WVIS after eight months and obtained a position at Washington DC but found the oldest radio format incompatible with her personality .

Williams continued sending tapes to other stations and on November 1 , 1987 , began as a weekend fill-in on New York City's WQHT . After the urban contemporary station hired her full-time to work overnight shifts , she left WDL . I can't read , oh , sorry , I cannot read this so small , so uh , all you have to do is Google search Wendy Williams .

You will find this on Wikipedia if you're interested . There's a lot more . It goes on and on and on , but for time's sake I will stop this and talk briefly about no , you know what I'm just going to stop . We're going to do the question of the day Growing up .

When you were growing up and you listened to the radio station , what was your disc jockey choice that you listened to ? Did you have a shock jog ? Do you remember your local radio station ? What was so spectacular about it ? I don't remember much about my radio

station . I know when I moved to dc , though the whole big talk of the town . I think it was howard , or it might have been , oh my gosh , man . No , not man Cow , was it man Cow ? One of those two were huge shock jocks in DC . I could be getting them wrong or mixed up with somebody else , but one of them got in huge trouble .

For remember a long time ago this is back in the mid-80s , late 80s there was a plane crash on in the Potomac River , in the bridge , and one of those shock jocks made some kind of a comment . I forget what it is now , but he got in huge trouble . I forgot who it was or what he said , but anyway , that's . I wish I could remember .

I have to look it up . All right , I gotta go . Thanks for listening . See you Bye .