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AOL’s ‘You’ve Got Mail’ Voice, Elwood Edwards, Dies at Age 74
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AOL’s ‘You’ve Got Mail’ voice, Elwood Edwards, dies at age 74 [theverge.com]:
AOL’s ‘You’ve Got Mail’ voice, Elwood Edwards, dies at age 74 AOL’s ‘You’ve Got Mail’ voice, Elwood Edwards, dies at age 74 / Edwards recorded the iconic phrase on a cassette tape in 1989. Share this story
Elwood Edwards, the voice of AOL’s “You’ve Got Mail” greeting, has died at age 74 after a long illness, according to local Ohio news station WKYC [wkyc.com], where he was employed for many years.
During a 2016 interview [youtube.com], Edwards recounted how he became the voice of AOL. His wife, who worked at Quantum Computer Services (which later became AOL), heard that the company was looking to add a voice to its software. “I’d been an announcer throughout my entire broadcasting career, and she volunteered me,” Edwards said.
In 1989, Edwards recorded the once-ubiquitous phrase, along with “Welcome,” “Files done,” and “Goodbye” on a cassette tape for just $200. “It started off as a test just to see if it would catch on, and lo and behold, in the mid-90s, it had really caught on.”
Since then, Edwards has made appearances on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon [youtube.com] and an episode of The Simpsons [youtu.be]. He was even spotted as an Uber driver [youtube.com].
As a longtime AOL user (yes, I still use AOL to this day), I’m ashamed to admit that I never knew there was a person behind that iconic voice — I thought it was computer-generated. Even now, Edwards’ voice will continue to live on in my inbox, which still declares, “You’ve Got Mail.”
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