Linda Yu Biography
Linda Yu is a former Chinese-American news anchor and author who co-anchored the WLS-TV Eyewitness Newscast in Chicago, Illinois from April 1984 to November 2016.
Yu became the first Asian-American broadcast journalist in Chicago when she began her news career at WMAQ-TV in 1979 in Chicago. Yu has won a total of five local Emmy Awards for her broadcasting work, including one for her article investigating the aftermath of 9/11 in 2001. In 1984, for her documentary “The Scars of Belfast,” Yu was honored with a National Gold Medal from the National Conference of Culture and Justice.
Linda Yu Age
Yu was born on 1 December 1946 in Xi’an, China. She is 76 years old as of 2023.
Linda Yu Family
Linda was born in South Asia to a Chinese family. Her family migrated to Hong Kong when she was three years old. Later, when Yu was five years old, they moved to the US. When Yu was twelve years old, they lived in Pennsylvania for four years, Indiana for two, and settled in California. Linda claimed during an interview that her mother wanted her to be a journalist. Born and raised in China, her mother was a daughter of royalty. She was studying writing and dreaming of becoming a professional, but she got married and became a homemaker.
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Linda Yu Husband and Children
Yu was married to Dr. Richard Baer, a psychiatrist. The couple married on June 12, 1982, at St. James Cathedral in Chicago. Yu and Baer were involved in a car accident on their honeymoon in southern France shortly after their wedding, which resulted in Baer being hospitalized due to a mild concussion. Yu and Baer were divorced in 1996. The couple has two children, a son Ricky born in July 1985, and a daughter, Francesca born in February 1989.
Linda Yu Education
Yu graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from the University of Southern California in 1968.
Linda Yu Daughter
Francesca Baer, the daughter of Linda, is an actress who plays the part of Olivia, an artificial intelligence research assistant, in the CBS drama, “Intelligence.”
Francesca studied at the Piven Theatre Workshop in Evanston and attended the Latin School of Chicago. She attended the University of Southern California afterward. She said during an email interview: “I never wanted to go into journalism, but I know I gained confidence in myself and in being on stage by watching how my mother handles herself on TV, during breaking news, and when she hosts/MCs events around Chicago. I’ve always been inspired by her.”
Linda Yu Salary
She was earning more than $69,150 annually at the time she was working as a news anchor for the Eyewitness newscast.
Linda Yu Net Worth
Yu has an estimated net worth of $2 million. This includes all her recorded assets.
Linda Yu Retirement
On September 6, 2016, after 46 years in the news and 37 years in the Chicago market, Yu announced her retirement from WLS-TV and TV news. Yu’s last news broadcast was at 4 PM on November 23. Windy City Live (an ABC 7 program) aired a tribute show to Yu earlier in the day, where her friends, family, colleagues, and former colleagues reviewed and praised her career and personal contributions to the city.
Linda Yu ABC
In April 1984, as a co-anchor of the station’s 4 PM newscast, Linda joined WLS-TV (ABC 7 Chicago) station mainly alongside news anchor Joel Daly until his retirement in 2005. She also served as co-anchor for the 30-minute 11:30 AM newscast with Sylvia Perez at the beginning of, 1992, before the hour-long 11 AM newscast was canceled in 2013. The first women in the Chicago market to co-anchor a newscast were Yu and Perez.
Linda Yu Book
As a guide to supporting young Chinese women in the global workplace, she published her book/ memoir,’ Lessons I Learned in America,’ in Chinese. To write her second book featuring exclusive tales of prominent Asian female entrepreneurs, political and cultural figures in the United States, Yu signed a book deal with a leading Chinese publisher.
Linda Yu Awards
For her study and coverage of a building accident in Chicago’s downtown Loop, Yu won a second Emmy award the following year. In 1987, Yu won the Spot Coverage Emmy for Outstanding Achievement in a Regularly Scheduled News Program. The first women in the Chicago market to co-anchor a newscast were Yu and Perez.
