Bill Geist

Biography

Bill Geist has been a correspondent for CBS News Sunday Morning since he joined CBS News in 1987. He chronicles some of the quirkiest people and places in America for the broadcast.

Geist has received two Emmy Awards for his work on Sunday Morning: one in 2005 for his profile of Fred Carl, who started the Viking Range company in Greenwood, Miss., and completely revitalized this small, impoverished town, and one in 1992 for his report on the 66th anniversary of America`s famed Route 66. He received the 2007 Marist College Lowell Thomas Award that recognizes individuals whose work "reflects the imagination, courage, ambition and humanity" of Thomas, the renowned author, traveler and broadcaster. Geist also has been awarded honorary doctoral degrees from the University of Cincinnati and the University of Illinois.

He has contributed his humor, observations and storytelling to many CBS News broadcasts, as well as various CBS Sports productions, including the 1992, 1994 and 1998 Olympic Winter Games, the World Series, the Super Bowl and the NCAA Division I basketball tournament. Geist contributed bi-weekly essays to 60 Minutes II(2003-04).

He is the best selling author of seven books: "Fore! Play; The Big Five Oh: Facing, Fearing and Fighting 50;" "Monster Trucks and Hair In A Can - Who Says America Doesn`t Make Anything Anymore?;" The New York Times bestseller "Little League Confidential," an account of his experience as a coach of his son`s and daughter`s Little League baseball teams; "The Zucchini Plague and Other Tales of Suburbia;" "City Slickers;" and, most recently, "Way Off the Road," a compendium of stories from Sunday Morning on "the peculiar charms of small-town America." Geist has contributed stories to numerous magazines ranging from New York to Chicago, Rolling Stone to Forbes and Vogue to Esquire.

Prior to joining CBS News, he was a columnist for The New York Times (1980-87), where his "About New York" column appeared twice a week. Before that, he worked for The Chicago Tribune, where he was a reporter and columnist (1972 80). Geist served as a combat photographer with the First Infantry Division in Vietnam (1969).

In addition to the two Emmys, he has won many awards for his work as a humorist, commentator and reporter in television, newspapers and magazines. Geist seems most proud, however, of taking third in the Illinois State Fair Bake Off in 1979.

He was born in Champaign, Ill. Geist was graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1968 with a degree in communications and from the University of Missouri in 1971 with a Master`s degree in communications. Geist lives in New York City with his wife. They have two children.

Publications

Way Off the Road:
Discovering the Peculiar Charms of Small Town America

Celebrated roving correspondent for CBS News Sunday Morning and bestselling author Bill Geist serves up a rollicking look at some small-town Americans and their offbeat ways of life.

"In rural Kansas, I asked our motel desk clerk for the name of the best restaurant in the area. After mulling it over, he answered: `I`d have to say the Texaco, `cuz the Shell don`t have no microwave.

Throughout his career, Bill Geist`s most popular stories have been about slightly odd but loveable individuals. Coming on the heels of his 5,600-mile RV trip across our fair land is Way Off the Road, a hilarious and compelling mix of stories about the folks featured in Geist`s segments, along with observations on his twenty years of life on the road.

Written in the deadpan style that has endeared him to millions, Geist shares tales of eccentric individuals, such as the ninety-three-year-old pilot-paperboy who delivers to his far-flung subscribers by plane; the Arizona mailman who delivers mail via horseback down the walls of the Grand Canyon; the Muleshoe, Texas, anchorwoman who delivers the news from her bedroom (occasionally wearing her bathrobe); and the struggling Colorado entrepreneur who finds success employing a sewer vacuum to rid Western ranchers of problematic prairie dogs.

Geist also takes us to events such as the Mike the Headless Chicken Festival (celebrating an inspiring bird that survived decapitation, hired an agent, and went on the road for eighteen months) and Sundown Days in Hanlontown, Iowa, where the town marks the one day a year when the sun sets directly between the railroad tracks.

Along the wacky and wonderful way, Geist shows us firsthand how life in fly-over America can be odd, strangely fascinating, hysterical, and anything but boring.