Vernon Winfrey Dies: Father Of Oprah Winfrey Was 89

Vernon Winfrey, the father of media mogul Oprah Winfrey, died Friday in Nashville, Tenn. at 89. No details on the cause were revealed. Oprah Winfrey confirmed the death with an Instagram post.

“Yesterday with family surrounding his bedside I had the sacred honor of witnessing the man responsible for my life, take his last breath,”Oprah Winfrey wrote. “We could feel peace enter the room at his passing.”

Oprah surprised her father by throwing him a surprise barbeque in Nashville on the Fourth of July. The event, called “Vernon Winfrey Appreciation Day,” included a barber chair to honor his long career as a barber. He owned his own Nashville shop for almost 50 years.

Vernon Winfrey also served as a member of Nashville’s Metro City Council for 16 years, and was a trustee for the Tennessee State University.

Oprah Winfrey spent her early childhood in her father’s hometown of Kosciusko, Mississippi, then in Milwaukee with her mother, Vernita Lee, who died in 2018. She also lived with her father in Nashville between ages 7 and 9, and during her teens.

“If I hadn’t been sent to my father (when I was 14), I would have gone in another direction,” Oprah Winfrey told the Washington Post in 1986. “I could have made a good criminal. I would have used these same instincts differently.”

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Oprah (@oprah)