Katherine Anne Couric ( KURR-ik; born January 7, 1957) is an American journalist and presenter. She is founder of Katie Couric Media, a multimedia news and production company. She also publishes a daily newsletter, Wake Up Call. Since 2016, she has hosted the podcast Next Question with Katie Couric.
Couric has been a television host at all of the Big Three television networks in the United States, and in her early career she was an assignment editor for CNN. She worked for NBC News from 1989 to 2006, CBS News from 2006 to 2011, and ABC News from 2011 to 2014. She was the first solo female anchor of a major network (CBS) evening news program. From 2013 to 2017, she was Yahoo's Global News Anchor. In 2021, she appeared as a guest host for the game show Jeopardy!, the first woman to host the flagship American version of the show in its history.
In addition to her roles in television news, Couric hosted Katie, a syndicated daytime talk show produced by Disney–ABC Domestic Television from September 2012 to June 2014. Some of her most important presenting roles include co-host of Today, anchor of the CBS Evening News, and as a correspondent for 60 Minutes. Couric's 2011 book, The Best Advice I Ever Got: Lessons from Extraordinary Lives, was a New York Times bestseller. In 2004, Couric was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame.
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Early life and career
Katherine Anne Couric was born in Arlington, Virginia, the daughter of Elinor Tullie (née Hene), a homemaker and part-time writer, and John Martin Couric Jr., a public relations executive and news editor at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the United Press in Washington, D.C. Her mother was Jewish, and converted to Presbyterianism before the marriage. Couric's maternal grandparents, Bert Hene and Clara L. Frohsin, were the children of Jewish emigrants from Germany. Couric's father had French, English, Scottish, and German ancestry. She was raised Presbyterian. In a report for Today, she traced her patrilineal ancestry back to a French orphan who immigrated to the U.S. in the 19th century, and became a broker in the cotton business.
Couric attended Arlington Public Schools: Jamestown Elementary, Williamsburg Middle School, and Yorktown High School, and was a cheerleader. As a high school student, she was an intern at Washington, D.C. all-news radio station WAVA. She enrolled at her father's alma mater, the University of Virginia, in 1975, and was a Delta Delta Delta sorority sister. Couric served in several positions at UVA's daily newspaper, The Cavalier Daily. During her fourth year at UVA, Couric was chosen to live as Senior Resident of The Lawn, the heart of Thomas Jefferson's Academical Village. She graduated in 1979, with a bachelor's degree in American Studies.
Career
Television career
Couric's first job in 1979 was at the ABC News bureau in Washington, D.C., later joining CNN as an assignment editor. Between 1984 and 1986, she worked as a general-assignment reporter for the then-CBS affiliate WTVJ in Miami, Florida.
During the following two years, she reported for WRC-TV, the NBC owned- and -operated station in Washington, D.C., work which earned her an Associated Press award and an Emmy.
Couric joined NBC News in 1989 as Deputy Pentagon Correspondent. From 1989 to 1991, Couric was an anchor substitute. She filled in for Bryant Gumbel as host of Today; Jane Pauley and Deborah Norville as co-anchor of Today; Boyd Matson, Garrick Utley, Mary Alice Williams, and Maria Shriver as co-host of Sunday Today; Chris Wallace, Garrick Utley and Tim Russert as anchor of Meet The Press, Scott Simon, Mike Schneider, Jack Ford, Jackie Nespral, Giselle Fernandez and Jodi Applegate as co-host of Weekend Today; Connie Chung, Bob Jamieson, John Palmer, Norville, Faith Daniels, Margaret Larson, Ann Curry, and Linda Vester as anchor of the former NBC News program NBC News at Sunrise. She also subbed for Daniels, Norville, and John Palmer as the news anchor on Today.
Couric returned to NBC to co-host the 2018 Winter Olympics opening ceremonies with Mike Tirico, and to provide additional Winter Olympic coverage and athlete interviews. During the opening ceremony she suggested, erroneously, that the Dutch use their skates as a normal mode of transportation during wintertime, prompting criticism and bemusement from the U.S. Embassy in the Netherlands and others. Couric apologized that her intended compliment did not "come out" as intended, which the Embassy accepted, and invited her to the Netherlands for a tour.
In 1989, Couric joined Today as national political correspondent, becoming a substitute co-host in February 1991, when Norville went on maternity leave. Norville did not return and Couric became permanent co-anchor on April 5, 1991. In 1994, she became co-anchor of Now with Tom Brokaw and Katie Couric—an evening time weekly TV newsmagazine with Tom Brokaw—which was later terminated and folded into part of Dateline NBC, where her reports appeared regularly and she was named the anchor. She remained at Today and NBC News for fifteen years until May 31, 2006, when she announced that she would be going to CBS to anchor CBS Evening News, becoming the first solo female anchor of the "Big Three" weekday nightly news broadcasts.
New media
In November 2013, Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer announced she had hired Couric as Global Anchor of Yahoo! News. Couric debuted in the new role on January 13, 2014, in an interview with former United States Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. She later interviewed United States Secretary of State John Kerry.
In March 2015, in an effort to collaborate and to consolidate their news pools, Yahoo News and ABC News has expanded their partnership to include specials and features, with Couric and other Yahoo editors to appear in daily segments on Good Morning America. The extended partnership secured Couric as having a spot in the ABC News division, as a special contributor.
In her book Going There, Couric admitted to editing a 2016 interview with Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The edits included removing portions of Ginsburg's statements that were critical of NFL protestors kneeling during the national anthem. Couric stated that her intent was to "protect" Ginsburg from her potentially unpopular comments as they were "unworthy of a crusader for equality".
In June 2017, after Verizon purchased Yahoo! and combined it into Oath, Couric decided to end her contract at Yahoo! News, preferring to work with them on a "project basis" only, while she continues to expand her own production company.
In 2017, Couric founded her own media company, Katie Couric Media. The company produces her newsletter, Wake Up Call and along with iHeartMedia, her weekly podcast, Next Question.
Other work
In a media crossover to animated film, Couric was the voice of news-reporter "Katie Current" in the US version of the film Shark Tale. She has also made cameo appearances in Austin Powers in Goldmember (as a Georgia State Prison guard) and an episode of General Hospital (as a journalist pretending to be a doctor: a storyline she helped create). She guest-starred as herself on the CBS sitcom Murphy Brown in 1992 and in the NBC sitcom Will & Grace in late 2002, and made a cameo appearance on a Pawn Stars episode. On May 12, 2003, she traded places for a day with Tonight Show host Jay Leno. Couric also co-hosted NBC's live coverage of Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade from 1991 until 2005. She received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement in 2005. Couric delivered the graduation speech at her alma mater University of Virginia on May 20, 2012, at Randolph-Macon College on June 1, 2013, and at Princeton University on June 1, 2009. She also works with Carmen Marc Valvo to help publicize the deadliness, yet preventability, of colorectal cancer. On May 16, 2010, Couric received an honorary doctor of science degree for her efforts in raising awareness of colorectal cancer and for her commitment to advancing medical research from Case Western Reserve University, and later gave the university's 2010 convocation keynote address. In 2016, she starred as herself in Sully to recreate the 60 Minutes interview for the film.
In 2011, she gave the university commencement speech at Boston University and was awarded another doctoral degree, Doctor of Humane Letters. She has also hosted a Sesame Street special, "When Families Grieve." The special, which aired on PBS on April 14, 2010, dealt with the issues that children go through when a parent dies. On February 6, 2011, Couric guest-starred on the post-Super Bowl episode of Glee, playing herself interviewing Sue Sylvester after the cheerleading team lost the championship. Sylvester sarcastically referred to Couric as "Diane Sawyer" during the segment.
Couric is the author of two children's books and a non-fiction collection of essays. Her children's books The Brand New Kid (2000) and The Blue Ribbon Day (2004) were illustrated by Marjorie Priceman and published by Doubleday. The Brand New Kid topped the New York Times best seller list for children's picture books, and was adapted into a 2006 musical by Melanie Marnich and Michael Friedman. Couric's third book, The Best Advice I Ever Got: Lessons from Extraordinary Lives, was published by Random House in 2011. The book is a collection of essays compiled over the past year by Couric; contributors include New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Queen Rania of Jordan, and former Today Show colleague Matt Lauer. Couric said that a 2010 convocation keynote address she gave inspired her to write the book. To this end, all profits of the book will be donated to Scholarship America.
Public image
Couric has been dubbed "America's Sweetheart," largely due to her co-anchor role for 15 years on The Today Show. On May 12, 2003, Couric guest-hosted The Tonight Show with Jay Leno as part of a swap campaign, and had 45 percent more viewers than on other nights. She has been the only guest host used by Jay Leno on either The Tonight Show or his short-lived The Jay Leno Show. Leno filled in for her on Today that same day. CNN and the New York Daily News noted that instead of using Leno's regular solid desk, "workers cut away the front of her desk to expose her legs while she interviewed American Idol judge Simon Cowell and Austin Powers star Mike Myers".
Personal life and charitable work
Family and relationships
Couric married attorney John Paul "Jay" Monahan III on June 10, 1989. She gave birth to their first daughter, in 1991; their second daughter was born in 1996. Her husband died of colorectal cancer in 1998 at the age of 42. In September 2013, she became engaged to financier John Molner after a two-year relationship. Couric married Molner in a small, private ceremony at her home in The Hamptons on June 21, 2014. The two star in the online cooking series Full Plate with Katie & John, appearing on the Sur La Table website.
Her sister Emily Couric, a Virginia Democratic state senator, died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 54 on October 18, 2001. Couric gave a eulogy at the funeral. She pointed out that it irritated Emily when people asked her if she was Katie Couric's sister. She told the mourners, "I just want you to know I will always be proud to say 'I am Emily Couric's sister'."
During a January 15, 2021 appearance on Real Time with Bill Maher, Couric revealed that she is distantly related to William Henry Harrison, the ninth president of the United States.
Cancer and advocacy
On September 28, 2022, Couric revealed that she had been diagnosed with breast cancer on June 21 of that year after a routine screening. She underwent surgery for the disease in July and began radiation treatment on September 7.
Couric had become a spokeswoman for colon cancer awareness ever since her first husband had died from the disease. She underwent a colonoscopy on-air in March 2000, and, according to a study published in 2003 in Archives of Internal Medicine, may have inspired many others to get checked as well: "Katie Couric's televised colon cancer awareness campaign was temporarily associated with an increase in colonoscopy use in two different data sets. This illustrates the possibility that a well-known individual can draw attention and support to worthwhile causes." On October 7, 2005, as part of National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, Couric broadcast her own mammogram on the Today show, in the hopes of recreating the "Couric Effect" around the issue of breast cancer. She also was very active in the National Hockey League's Hockey Fights Cancer campaign, appearing in some public service announcements and doing voice-overs for several others.
Couric was the honored guest at the 2004 Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation fall gala. As the Guest of Honor for the inaugural American Cancer Society Discovery Ball, Couric was recognized for her leadership in increasing cancer awareness and screening. In 2011, Couric became the Honorary National Chair of the National Parkinson Foundation's Moving Day campaign, a grassroots campaign to spotlight Parkinson's disease awareness on a national level. Couric's father died in 2011 at age 90 from complications due to Parkinson's disease.
In November 2023, Couric, alongside Jean Trebek (widow of Alex Trebek), launched "The Alex Trebek Fund" in partnership with Stand Up to Cancer, to support scientists working on improving screening and treatment options for pancreatic cancer.
