As the solo host of Morning Edition since its first broadcast in 1979, Bob Edwards has shaped the sound of National Public Radio (NPR) in the morning. He has captured the morning news audience that was largely abandoned by commercial outlets and built a loyal weekly listenership of more than 12 million.

Edwards is a man of contradictions. He has won most of the major awards in broadcasting, but he likes to say that his job security lies in the fact that no one else wants to work his hours. He's an elected union official who insists on every nickel in a contract, yet he spends weeks each year on the road raising money for public radio stations.

Edwards came to NPR in 1974 as a newscaster. In a matter of months, he was chosen to co host All Things Considered (ATC). Susan Stamberg, who shared the microphone with Edwards for five years, says he made up for his limited experience with clear writing and "that terrific voice."

Edwards actually came to the job with a background in commercial radio; he worked first at WHEL-AM in New Albany, Indiana, and then as an anchor and newscaster for Armed Forces Radio and Television when he was in the Army in Korea. After the army, Edwards moved to Washington, D.C., where he worked as a part-time anchor for WTOP-AM while earning a master's degree in communication from American University. At American University, he absorbed the gospel of Edward R. Murrow-style journalism from Ed Bliss, Jr., a former news writer for Murrow at the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS). Bliss passed on Murrow's insistence on active, uncluttered language and his love of sound in telling the story. Susan Stamberg says that Edwards had a very old-fashioned news style when he came to NPR but that he made her "understand the greatness of Edward R. Murrow." She says Edwards' understated style provided a good balance for her exuberance: "His coolness permitted me to be hotter." Edwards says he learned to be like the straight man in a comedy team, a skill that served him well later in his 12-year broadcast relationship with Red Barber.

Edwards' tenure on ATC came during the years that Frank Mankiewicz ran NPR and began seriously marketing it. "There was a lot of buzz," Edwards says. "That was the point at which people started taking us seriously as a news source."

Edwards and Stamberg felt mildly threatened in 1978 when the network began planning for a morning program. NPR's news resources were stretched thin already, and the ATC hosts weren't anxious to share reporters and production help with a rival that got on the air before they did. They were relieved when, after a year of planning, the first Morning Edition production team came up with a pilot that was laughably bad. It was chatty and sounded, says Edwards, like "a bad talk show in a small market." The network had already promoted the new show heavily to program directors at member stations, so it had to come up with something. Management fired most of the first ME team, recruited producers from other NPR shows, and then called on Bob Edwards to fill in as host for 30 days, until someone new could be hired. "Thirty days didn't sound so long," he says, "although it meant getting up each day at 1:00 A.M." By the time the 30 days had passed, it was apparent that Edwards' calm and reassuring presence was a perfect fit to the mood of a morning audience.

Edwards credits producer Jay Kernis with getting him through the early days of the program by crafting a system that could support a single anchor through two hours of news, interviews, and features each day. The system meant scripting as much of the anchor talk as possible and preparing thorough questions for every interview.

Edwards' own interests helped set the show's agenda. He was a sports fan, a relative rarity among NPR staffers, and he warmed to the show's daily sports segments. The need for daily sports features helped bring the show commentators such as Bill Littlefield and Frank Deford. Most significantly, it brought Red Barber out of retirement to do a four-minute commentary every Friday at 7:35 EDT. As a veteran of more than 50 years in radio, the "01' Redhead" had no interest in cranking out a taped segment each week. He wanted a live conversation with the host, a prospect that Edwards found daunting, because the great sportscaster was as apt to talk about philosophy, religion, or raising camellias as about sports. Edwards eventually wrote a book about his on-air friendship with Barber, Fridays with Red, saying that the relationship helped him grow in confidence and maturity as a broadcaster.

Edwards' favorite awards show the range of concerns he brings to Morning Edition. He won his first Gabriel Award in 1987 from the National Catholic Association of Broadcasters for a story called "Bill of Sale: A Black Heritage," about a Maryland man who assembled a small museum of artifacts from his own family's enslavement, including the record of the transaction in which one of his ancestors was sold as chattel. Edwards won a second Gabriel in 1990 for "Born Drunk," a five-part series about fetal alcohol syndrome. In 1995 he won the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award for "The Changing of the Guard: The Republican Revolution." A highlight of that series was Edwards' interview with Representative Dick Armey of Texas, in which the House majority leader averred that voters would be so happy with Republican leadership that the GOP's promise to limit lawmakers' terms wouldn't mean much. The comment caused an uproar among Republicans, who insisted on the promises in the GOP's "Contract with America," and Armey was forced to backpedal. In 1999 Morning Edition received a George Foster Peabody award lauding Edwards as "a man who embodies the essence of excellence in radio."

Edwards was on the air the morning of 11 September 2001 when terrorists attacked New York and Washington, D.C. NPR's coverage of events that day earned a George Foster Peabody Award and a duPont-Columbia Award.