María de la Soledad Teresa O'Brien's Birthday

María de la Soledad Teresa O'Brien was born September 19, 1966.

She is an American broadcast journalist and executive producer. Since 2016, O'Brien has been the host of Matter of Fact with Soledad O'Brien, a nationally syndicated weekly talk show produced by Hearst Television. 

She is chairwoman of Starfish Media Group, a multiplatform media production company and distributor that she founded in 2013.

• Soledad co-anchored CNN's American Morning from 2003 to 2007.
• She was the anchor of CNN's morning news program Starting Point from 2012 to 2013.
• In 2013, O'Brien became a special correspondent on the Al Jazeera America news program America Tonight.
• Soledad is also a correspondent on HBO's Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel.

Soledad O'Brien's Reel

Soledad O’Brien is an award-winning journalist, speaker, author and philanthropist who anchors and produces the Hearst Television political magazine program “Matter of Fact with Soledad O’Brien.” 

 O’Brien, founder and CEO of Soledad O’Brien Productions, also reports for HBO Real Sports, the PBS NewsHour, WebMD and has authored two books. She has appeared on networks, Fox and Oxygen and anchored and reported for NBC, MSNBC and CNN. She has won numerous awards, including three Emmys, the George Peabody award, an Alfred I DuPont prize and the Gracie. Newsweek Magazine named her one of the “15 People Who Make America Great.” 

With her husband, Brad Raymond, she is the founder of the PowHERful Foundation that helps young women get to and through college. 

She is very active on Twitter: @soledadobrien

Soledad O'Brien

Soledad O’Brien, host and producer of MATTER OF FACT, is an award-winning documentarian, journalist, speaker, author and philanthropist.

She is CEO of Starfish Media Group, a multi-platform media production and distribution company.

O'Brien has produced non-scripted programming, dozens of documentaries, and presented live events, concert specials, and award shows on numerous platforms, including CNN, Nat Geo, HBO, NBC, MSNBC, A&E Network, and Lifetime.

She currently reports for HBO’s “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel,” regularly contributes to the PBS NewsHour and WebMD, and serves as host and Executive Producer of both Mysteries and Scandals on Oxygen and “Who Shot Biggie & Tupac?” on FOX.

Soledad and her husband, Brad

She is the author of two critically acclaimed books and the winner of multiple Emmy awards, the George Foster Peabody Award and the Alfred I. DuPont Award.

O’Brien and her husband also created the PowHERful Foundation, which helps get young women get into and through college.

Follow her on Twitter: @soledadobrien

Soledad and Aspen

Soledad O'Brien, looking good at 50, on her horse, Aspen.  Photo: AARP - the magazine

Soledad O'Brien at 50

NBC  1991

MSNBC's The Site 1996

Former CNN anchor Soledad O’Brien is celebrating her 50th birthday today, September 19, and added another line to her long journalism resume. This month she began hosting the Hearst-backed syndicated Sunday morning political show Matter of Fact.

Rather than the typical opposing views and unchallenged talking points approach some of the Sunday morning shows take, she plans to focus on policy issues.

Through her Starfish Media production company, she is also working on a documentary about how high-level military people transition into the job market.

NAACP President's Award, 2007

It's the birthday of Soledad O'Brien

Happy birthday to Soledad!

Birthdate: September 19, 1966

Birthplace: Saint James, New York

Mother: Estella, a Black Cubana (Afro-Cuban), was a French and English teacher.

Father: Edward, an Australian (from Toowoomba, Australia) of Irish descent, was a mechanical engineering professor.

Soledad's parents, both immigrants, met at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland in 1958 and married in 1959. Interracial marriage was illegal in Maryland then, so the couple was married in Washington, D.C.

for more see biography page

Soledad O'Brien Celebrates 48th Birthday

Birthdate: September 19, 1966
Birthplace: Saint James, New York
Mother: Estella, a Black Cubana (Afro-Cuban), was a French and English teacher.
Father: Edward, an Australian (from Toowoomba, Australia) of Irish descent, was a mechanical engineering professor.

Soledad's parents, both immigrants, met at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland in 1958 and married in 1959. Interracial marriage was illegal in Maryland then, so the couple was married in Washington, D.C.

Her full name is Maria de la Soledad Teresa O'Brien. From Spanish, her first name would translate as, "The Blessed Virgin Mary of Solitude." When she started working in TV, many people recommended that she change her name, but she refused.

Soledad attended Smithville High School in New York and has a BA from Harvard University. Soledad is the fifth of six children, all of whom graduated from Harvard University

O’Brien served as an anchor and special correspondent for CNN starting in 2003 and was the co-anchor of CNN’s flagship morning program, “American Morning,” and then the anchor of “Starting Point with Soledad O’Brien.”

After leaving CNN to start her own production company, Starfish Media Group, Soledad O'Brien joined Al Jazeera America in 2013. She contributes short-form segments as Special Correspondent to Al Jazeera America’s primetime current affairs magazine program America Tonight and Starfish will produce hour-long documentary specials. Soledad also reports for HBO's Real Sports program.

What is Soledad O'Brien paying attention to these days?

What is Soledad O'Brien paying attention to these days? According to adweek.com

• IN THE MORNING: It's Twitter then email
• ON TWITTER:  friends, Kim Bondy and Bevy Smith - Ezra Klein, Ross Douthat, Roland Martin, Ryan Lizza
• OTHER SOCIAL MEDIA: Instagram (to keep up with her girls)
• TV (on her iPad) Being Mary Jane, Scandal
  
•  NEW APP: her son, Jackson, is about 95 percent deaf, so she is using Marlee Signs, an app created by Marlee Matlin that teaches you sign language. 
• Blackberry or iPhone?  Both. Likes the Blackberry keyboard
• READING:  Improbable Scholars: The Rebirth of a Great American School System and a Strategy for America's Schools by David L. Kirp - Promises Kept: Raising Black Boys to Succeed in School and in Life, written by a couple following their son and his friend as they go off to Dalton in New York. and Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow.

How well do you know Soledad O'Brien?

Reuters

Now that we have published over 600 posts about Soledad O'Brien,
we offer you this quiz on Soledad.

AP Photo

Family Values

Baby Soledad with her mom and dad

Soledad with her husband and children

(l-r) Cecilia, (2002), Sofia Elizabeth (2000), the twins, Charlie and Jackson, (2004)

,

The O'Brien clan, 1967, Soledad being held by her mom

Soledad's mother and grandmother in Cuba, 1944

It's the Birthday of Soledad O'Brien

Photo: Peter Tang/Chicago Maroon

Birthdate: September 19, 1966
Birthplace: Saint James, New York
Mother: Estella, a Black Cubana (Afro-Cuban), was a French and English teacher.
Father: Edward, an Australian (from Toowoomba, Australia) of Irish descent, was a mechanical engineering professor.

Soledad's parents, both immigrants, met at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland in 1958 and married in 1959. Interracial marriage was illegal in Maryland then, so the couple was married in Washington, D.C.

Her full name is Maria de la Soledad Teresa O'Brien. From Spanish, her first name would translate as, "The Blessed Virgin Mary of Solitude." When she started working in TV, many people recommended that she change her name, but she refused.

Education: Smithville High School (NY) and Harvard University (BA)

Soledad is the fifth of six children, all of whom graduated from Harvard University

She joined Al Jazeera America in 2013 as part of a deal with her new production company, Starfish Media Group. She will contribute short-form segments as Special Correspondent to Al Jazeera America’s primetime current affairs magazine program “America Tonight,” and Starfish will produce long-form documentary specials.

Soledad also reports for HBO's Real Sports program.

O’Brien had previously served as an anchor and special correspondent for CNN. She joined CNN in 2003 and was the co-anchor of CNN’s flagship morning program, “American Morning,” and then the  anchor of “Starting Point with Soledad O’Brien.”

What is Black Identity and Who Determines It?

Eric Deggans wrote an interesting post about the recent CNN Black in America installment "Who is Black in America?" hosted by Soledad O'Brien which examined some "impressive teens in a Philadelphia spoken word workshop led by a biracial poet who has explored his own questions about race and identity."

“There’s a lot of pain behind these conversations,” said O’Brien. “The conversation is about what we value in America. And what is the role of skin color in our values? They’re conversations we in America don’t particularly like to have.”

Of course, Soledad is herself the child of an Irish father from Australia and Afro-Cuban mother. She self-identifies as black, but her non-white roots are in Cuba not America.

What is “black” identity and who determines it?

As Deggan point out:

"Most of the youths in CNN’s documentary talk about being black, they mean African American. And unlike some of the kids she profiles, O’Brien doesn’t believe anyone gets to choose their racial identity."

“This idea that someone gets to choose seems odd,” added the anchor. “I’m lighter-skinned than the president of the United States, but my mom is black, my brothers and sisters are black, my mom has a short afro. I never thought I had a choice about how I identified... My identity was given to me very early by my parents.”

O’Brien’s documentary also doesn’t mention the most famous person navigating issues of race and identity in modern times: President Barack Obama. And the reason Obama isn’t featured is the same reason O’Brien doesn’t tell her story, even though the details — she was raised as an Afro-Cuban/Irish child in an all-white neighborhood where she felt “people like me weren’t attractive” — seems the embodiment of the documentary’s spirit.

“It’s not my story,” she said. “This is about digging into the uncomfortable, and sometimes painful conversations with the people we’re profiling.”

All the same, I can’t wait to see the documentary about how a nerdy kid who was told non-white people weren’t pretty became a top anchor at CNN eventually named to People magazine’s list of 50 Most Beautiful People.

You've Got Soledad O'Brien

Soledad talks to AOL about herself - including the story behind her full name - and why some people advised her to change it for her career. (She didn't!)

 

Happy Birthday Soledad O'Brien

Today is the birthday of Soledad O'Brien.

Soledad was born on September 19, 1966 in Saint James, Long Island, New York.

She was christened Maria de la Soledad Teresa O'Brien. From Spanish, her first name would translate as, "The Blessed Virgin Mary of Solitude." Her first name follows a Spanish tradition of naming a child for Our Lady of Solitude.

Soledad's mom, Estella, is Afro-Cuban and worked as a French and English teacher. Her father, Edward, is from Australia of Irish descent, and for many years was a mechanical engineering professor.

After graduating Smithville High School (NY), she attended Harvard University as did all of her five siblings.

Soledad married Brad Raymond, an investment banker, in 1995. They have four children - Sofia Elizabeth (2000), Cecilia (2002) and the twins, Charlie and Jackson (2004).

Soledad O'Brien's Harvard Years

Soledad O'Brien grew up in a family that valued education. Her father was a professor of mechanical engineering at Stony Brook University and her mother taught Spanish and French in the Smithtown high schools. Her father had a very immigrant mentality: No matter what happens, no one can take away your education.

Like her older siblings, she got into Harvard. But she left Harvard where she took pre-med courses while majoring in English during her senior year to take a production assistant job at WBZ-TV in Boston.

She rose quickly and soon headed to NBC News in New York, then station KRON in San Francisco, and then back to New York to co-anchor NBC’s Weekend Today. She moved to CNN in 2003.

Were her educator parents disappointed in her decision to leave college?

"I think that they really got it. My parents were not ambitious for us to go to Harvard, as many parents are. My parents were ambitious for us to do as well as we possibly could in school, and to get an education and to do everything well. And I went right from school to working, so it wasn’t like I was sitting on the couch trying to decide what I was going to do with my life. I think that would have sent my parents into a tailspin. I really immediately liked my job and I think it helped them that I had not a moment of regret."

And when the time was right, she returned to Harvard. In 2000, when she was pregnant, she returned and finished college very quickly.

"I didn’t have much to finish. And it was funny, once you’re in the workforce, you’re a much better student. You’re very organized. You’re not hanging out with people or going to keg parties. You’re on Amtrak, schlepping back and forth. And in those four hours, you’re reading books and writing papers. I was pregnant, so I was ragingly sick. That part was miserable. But I knew that if I didn’t do it, I would never do it.

My husband used to joke that he was dating a coed. But no: I didn’t wear makeup and I wore sweats like everybody else. I remember, that year I was named one of People magazine’s 50 most beautiful people. A professor said to me, 'Hey, I saw you in People magazine.' I said, "Hey, you read People magazine?"

Soledad O'Brien - Growing Up on Long Island

Long Island Pulse Magazine did a cover story recently on Soledad O'Brien who grew up on the island in St. James and attended Smithtown High School.

Though she now splits her time between a Chelsea apartment and a country house in Putnam County, she also spends an incredible amount of time on the road.

She talked about growing up in St. James, at a time when being biracial was certainly less accepted. She wrote about that time in her recent book The Next Big Story: My Journey Through the Land of Possibilities.

A younger Soledad

She graduated Smithtown High School East in 1984 and describes the feeling of being of mixed-race heritage like being in “perpetual motion,” as in a dodgeball game. "When you move, you can’t get hit, ” she wrote.

Still, Maria de la Soledad O’Brien, the next to youngest of six children, followed in the footsteps of all her siblings and attended Harvard.

Her family was well associated with education. Her mother, black and Cuban, taught Spanish and French in the Smithtown high schools. Her father, Australian of Irish and Scottish descent, was a professor of mechanical engineering at Stony Brook University.

One of her early passions was horseback riding (She mucked stalls to pay for riding lessons.), a passion that she still pursues.

It may be hard to believe with her current fame and popularity, but she never dated in high school because she was considered “different.”

The Pulse article covers growing up on Long Island, balancing career and parenting, returning to college as an adult, experiencing changes in journalism and finding ways to help students.

"My parents were really good at making us very aware of who we were, where we came from, what we had to be proud of, and not to worry so much about fitting in and blending in. That was not really the goal. There are lots of good things to get out of growing up on Long Island, and that’s what we were there for."

O'Brien Back in the Saddle

Soledad O'Brien reports via Twitter that "5 months after tearing up my knee I'm hopping back on my horse. Must admit I'm anxious. Very. Ugh. & a crappy rainy day doesn't help." - and a few hours later "Back on the ol' horse! Me and Virgil (not quite ready for my horse Charlotte yet). Felt great. Need to get back to the gym to get some muscle in my leg!

Soledad's 2011 Resolutions

Soledad O'Brien posted on Facebook that her new year's resolutions list is "about 30 items long."

The items on top are:

• learn meditation--(thank you Russell Simmons!) 
• run a triathalon (sprint distance--once my knee heels--thank you Nicole and Marissa). 
• get organized. 
• downsize. 
• launch my foundation (helping girl's get to and through college)
• take salsa lessons. 
• give up learning to cook. 
• do less.
• have more fun.

O'Brien's Knee Surgery Up Close

Soledad O'Brien's recent knee surgery will be a segment on Dr. Sanjay Gupta's CNN Saturday/Sunday morning show at 7:30am ET.

Soledad tweeted that:

Let's just say - if you're squeamish you might want to look away when the Dr. puts the scope in my knee! My co-workers & I sorta screamed.

Talking With Soledad - Time Magazine

Soledad O'Brien spoke with TIME senior reporter Andrea Sachs about growing up with racial prejudice and falling in love with the television business.

I was surprised reading your book how difficult it was for you growing up.

I remember once when I was in college we were in a class on African-American studies and somebody was talking about the tragic mulatto. At some point it dawned on me, they were talking about me. I was the tragic mulatto. In some ways it was a very regular, fun, normal, middle-class Long Island existence. We had beaches, we had pets, we had a big yard. But there was always this sort of undercurrent of not blending in, of not fitting in and of people not necessarily wanting you there. It was very, very difficult for my parents.

Your parents were not legally allowed to get married because of their different races.

Students gasp [when they hear that]. I tell that story a lot when I speak to college students, and I think it helps provide a framework for them on how far we've come, and also what other people have had to overcome.

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/arts/