Vernon Jarrett Death
On May 23, 2004, Vernon Jarrett passed away in Chicago from cancer.
Vernon Jarrett Biography
Vernon Jarrett was an African-American journalist who worked in newspaper, television and was an influential commentator on race relations, politics, and African-American history
Vernon Jarrett Family
Jarrett was born by William and Annie were schoolteachers in Saulsbury, Tennessee.
Vernon Jarrett Spouse
Fernetta Jarrett was the wife of Vernon Jarrett. William R. Jarrett and Thomas S. Jarrett were their sons. Obstetrician Dr. William Jarrett married Valerie Bowman in 1983. Laura was the couple’s only child, and William and Valerie divorced in 1988. A heart attack claimed William Jarrett’s life in 1993 at the age of 40. Laura Jarrett, Vernon’s granddaughter, works as a well-known CNN journalist.
Vernon Jarrett Career
Jarrett received a football scholarship to attend Knoxville College in Tennessee, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in history and sociology in 1941. He relocated to Chicago in 1946, where he started working as a journalist for the Chicago Defender. He covered a race riot in his first assignment for the Defender. During the 1940s, he also had a job with the Associated Negro Press. He collaborated with composer Oscar Brown Jr. for three years starting in 1948 to create Negro Newsfront, the first daily radio news program in the United States to be produced by African Americans.
He produced nearly 2,000 television broadcasts while working as a host on Chicago’s ABC-TV station, WLS, during his time at the Tribune.
He left the Tribune in 1983 to work as an opinion columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times. He later joined the editorial board of the Sun-Times and left the paper in 1995.
He was the second president of the National Association of Black Journalists, which he founded.
Jarrett was the first African American to be a syndicated columnist for the Chicago Tribune, beginning in 1970.