| Summary: | Television host and author Tavis Smiley was born on September 13, 1964, in Gulfport, Mississippi. The third of ten children, he grew up near an Air Force base in Kokomo, Indiana. Smiley spent a semester interning in the office of Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley. Graduating from Indiana University with a B. S. degree in public affairs, he returned to Los Angeles working as an adviser to the City Council president. Smiley later started the Smiley Report, a radio news commentary, before starting his own television talk show on BET, Tonight with Tavis Smiley. The show earned national recognition for its eclectic programming. Since his departure from BET, Smiley served as a correspondent for Prime Time Thursday, Good Morning America, and a commentator for CNN and National Public Radio, and host of The Tavis Smiley Show on the Public Broadcasting Service. He authored five books, including How to Make Black America Better.
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