- published: 18 Feb 2016
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Pat Sajak (/ˈseɪdʒæk/ SAY-jak, born Patrick Leonard Sajdak; October 26, 1946) is an American television personality, former weatherman, actor and talk show host, best known as the host of the American television game show Wheel of Fortune.
Sajak, the son of a Polish American factory worker, was born and raised in Chicago. His mother, Joyce, remarried Walter Backal. He graduated from Farragut High School in 1964, then went to Columbia College Chicago while working as a desk clerk at the Palmer House hotel. He served in uniform as a disc jockey in Vietnam for Armed Forces Radio
Vanna White (born February 18, 1957) is an American television personality and film actress best known as the hostess of Wheel of Fortune since 1982.
White was born Vanna Marie Rosich in Conway, South Carolina, the daughter of Joan Marie and Miguel Angel Rosich. Her father was Puerto Rican and Croatian. He abandoned the family and White took the name of her stepfather, Herbert Stackley White Jr., a former real estate agent in what is now North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
White's first appearance in a game show was on the June 20, 1980 episode of The Price Is Right, in which she was among the first four contestants. She did not make it onstage, but the clip of her running to Contestants' Row was rebroadcast as part of The Price Is Right 25th Anniversary Special in August 1996 and also was featured on the special broadcast Game Show Moments Gone Bananas. After Wheel of Fortune hostess Susan Stafford left in October 1982, White was chosen as one of three substitute hostesses (along with Vicki McCarty and Summer Bartholomew) to co-host the show. On December 13, 1982, White became the show's regular hostess.