Kathy
O'Malley & Judy Markey
Hosts
Biography
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Career
Highlights:
- From 1989
- 2009, Kathy and Judy were on the air at WGN. They were as confounded
by this as anybody. Their topics ranged from kids to sex to politics
to daily calamities, which explains why they prefered talking
to real listeners about their real lives rather than to people
hawking their latest book.
- They received
the nationally recognized Gracie Award in 2006 and 2008.
 Judy
Markey Biography:
Judy Markey
has been a broadcaster, novelist, and journalist. From 1989 - 2009
she and Kathy O’Malley co-hosted Chicago's top-rated midday
program, "The Kathy & Judy Show” on WGN Radio 720.
The show could be heard in over ten states by more than a half million
listeners each week.
For sixteen
years Judy chronicled the insanities of contemporary life in her
syndicated column for Chicago Sun-Times. Her first novel, The Daddy
Clock, published in 1998 by Bantam Books, was immediately optioned
by Touchstone Pictures, and has been translated into five languages.
Her second novel, Just Trust Me, was released by Mira Books in August
2004. Judy's first two books -- collections of her syndicated columns
-- were How To Survive Your High School Reunion and Other Mid-Life
Crises, and You Only Get Married For The First Time Once.
 In
2004 Crain’s Chicago Business named Kathy and Judy among “Chicago’s
One Hundred Most Influential Women”. In March 2005, she and
Kathy were named two of the “Top One Hundred Talk Show Hosts”
in the country by Talkers Magazine. In April 2005 she was inducted
into Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism
Hall of Achievement. Kathy and Judy received the nationally recognized
Gracie Award for “Outstanding Talk Show Radio” in 2006.
Judy has two
adult children, two adult stepchildren, and is married to Tom Collinger,
who is the Associate Dean of Medill at Northwestern University.
 Kathy
O'Malley Biography:
From 1989 -
2009, Kathy O’Malley and Judy Markey co-hosted “The
Kathy & Judy Show”, which originally started as a once-a-week
experiment. The real-life friends, who were competing journalists
from rival Chicago newspapers when their show began, handled the
9am to noon shift weekdays on WGN Radio 720.
Kathy attended
Northern Illinois University (but dropped out to get married and
have babies, which was a very popular thing to do in the ‘60s).
She joined the Chicago Tribune in 1979 as a secretary to “Tower
Ticker” Columnist Aaron Gold. She was promoted to reporter
in 1983 and became a co-writer of the “Inc.” column,
covering the entertainment field. In 1994, she retired from the
column to become a features writer for the Arts, Tempo and magazine
sections of the Chicago Tribune; she left the paper in 1995 when
her radio show was expanded to four hours a day.
Kathy first
appeared on WGN Radio in the mid-80s, providing entertainment reports
for the Wally Phillips and Roy Leonard shows. For a time she also
hosted a nationally syndicated daily entertainment report called
“Campbell’s Souperstars.”
 Kathy
is a co-founder of the Aaron Gold Scholarship Fund at the Theatre
School at DePaul University. She has served as a member of the Chicago
Leadership Council of the National Osteoporosis Foundation and as
a volunteer for Open Hand Chicago and the tutoring program at Chicago’s
Fourth Presbyterian Church. She has run one marathon, which was
plenty, and several half marathons. Unfortunately, she still isn’t
thin.
Kathy is the
mother of two adult children, Patrick and Colleen, and grandmother
of four. She lives on Chicago’s north side, where she can
usually be found in the garden, and she hasn’t cooked a balanced
meal since 1983.
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