Merri Dee, a fixture on Chicago TV screens for decades as a reporter and anchor for WGN-TV, has died at 85, the news station reported Wednesday.
A trailblazing broadcaster who won the hearts of Chicagoans while hosting public affairs shows and pulling lottery numbers over a 43-year tenure at WGN, Ms. Dee also was a fierce advocate for victims of violent crime following her own near-death brush with a kidnapper while she worked at another television station.
On her own from age 14, Ms. Dee graduated from Englewood High School in the 1950s, and as a single mother, she graduated from Midwestern Broadcasting School, now known as Columbia College. "In the heavy moments that followed, I realized that I’m not dead," she later wrote. "I fervently prayed, ‘Dear God, help me.’ … Instead of a great white light, I heard the roar of the ocean … saw a vision."Ms. Dee’s guest, amateur psychic Alan Sandler, was killed. She managed to drag herself to the side of a road to flag down help. After a year of fighting through paralysis and blindness, she was hired by WGN as one of the first Black news anchors in a major city.
"Merri Dee was a homegrown, broadcasting legend whose time as an anchor and radio and talk show host made her a beloved, local celebrity," Mayor Lori Lightfoot said in a statement. "In addition to her television and radio work, she also made a huge impact on communities across our city and state through a number of philanthropic pursuits that reflected her passion for protecting vulnerable individuals such as children in need of adoptive homes.
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