Vernon Winfrey, longtime Nashville businessman, civic leader and Oprah’s father, died on Friday in Nashville. The media mogul confirmed her father’s passing in a post on Instagram.
“Yesterday with family surrounding his bedside I had the sacred honor of witnessing the man responsible for my life, take his last breath,” Oprah wrote. “We could feel peace enter the room at his passing.”
Winfrey, 89, was known for his barber shop in East Nashville’s Cleveland Park, which he opened in 1965. He was elected to the Metro Council in 1975 where he served several terms and helped to bring improvements to East Nashville.
On the Fourth of July, Oprah surprised her father by throwing him a surprise barbecue in Nashville, calling the gathering “Vernon Winfrey Appreciation Day.” The event included a barber chair to honor his long career as a barber and owning a shop for nearly 50 years. Oprah had previously announced that her father was ill with cancer.
Oprah has given credit to her father for turning her life around and setting the course for her ultimate rise from Nashville media to a worldwide media mogul. She came to live with Vernon as young teen after a rough childhood spent with her late mother in Mississippi and Milwaukee.
Tasha AF Lemley/WPLN News Calvin Boyd, a longtime customer, sets up a memorial tribute to Vernon Winfrey on Sunday in front of the barber shop on Lischey Avenue.
“If I hadn’t been sent to my father [when I was 14], I would have gone in another direction,” Oprah told the Washington Post in 1986. “I could have made a good criminal. I would have used these same instincts differently.”
Winfrey’s service to others is also being praised on social media and at the site of his barber shop on Lischey Avenue.
On Sunday afternoon, Calvin Boyd arranged a memorial of flowers and candles, saying he was preparing for a candlelight vigil on Monday at 5 p.m. Boyd was Winfrey’s customer from the age of 7.
“He cut my hair for 30 years. Then my son, he cut my son’s hair,” Boyd said. “He also cut people’s hair in the community for free if they didn’t have any money. He was a real good man, a real nice man, and we really going to miss him.”
Winfrey’s community impact is being acknowledged by civic and government leaders, including a tweet by Mayor John Cooper: “Vernon served on Metro Council for 16 years, and dedicated his life to entrepreneurship, barbering and mentoring young men in the community. An Army veteran and deacon, he leaves behind a legacy of service.”
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