AOL’s “You’ve Got Mail!” voice Elwood Edwards, 74, died on Nov. 5. Edwards worked at WKYC in Ohio as a camera operator and tech guy. In 1989 he was paid $200 by upcomer AOL (where his wife worked) to record the messages “Welcome,” “You’ve Got Mail,” “Files done,” and “Goodbye”—soon, his voice was reverberating all over the world. “I had no idea it would become what it did, I don’t think anybody did,” said Edwards. “Suddenly, AOL took off… I remember standing in line at CompUSA and seeing stacks of AOL CDs and thinking, ‘my voice is on every one of those, and nobody has a clue.’” Edwards stayed with WKYC, his fame ebbing and waning; he appeared on the occasional talk show and podcast. But “I didn’t enjoy being on camera as much as I enjoyed being behind the scenes,” he said in 2019.
Related Posts
