Inducted 2012
radio, TV and documentary news storyteller, WDIV-TV Detroit
Dwayne X. Riley
Broadcast news anchor, reporter, writer and documentary storyteller Dwayne X. Riley believes that “getting it right means finding the truth.”
From contributing to his elementary school newspaper to serving in the U.S. Army at the Far East Network Newsroom in Tokyo to managing several Michigan broadcast newsrooms, Riley eventually joined the news team of Detroit’s Channel 4—and stayed for 35 years until his retirement in 1994.
Early in his career, Riley wrote, produced and anchored 25 award-winning half-hour programs featuring Michigan prisons. These were used by several universities in their criminal justice curricula. His “Roads to Rails” documentary on the struggle between railroads and truckers is recorded in the Library of Congress.
Two of his well-known documentaries include “Eyes of Age,” where he lived for a week in a retirement home and showed the loneliness and strength of those around him, and “Skid Row,” where he lived in a “flop house” and reported on the circumstances of others who were fighting for survival because they had fallen into unfortunate circumstances.
His “Riley’s World” human interest stories in the newscast made people smile about the foibles of the human condition. Over the years, hundreds of Michiganders appeared in his segments.
His work has been recognized with multiple national AP and UPI awards for individual reporting, AFTRA Golden Mike and Gabriel awards, the NATAS Governor’s Award, AP documentary awards and six EMMYs, to name a few.
Riley has the ability to “take all of that emotion, all of those experiences from a life lived, and create something that lives on in the hearts of TV viewers long after the newscast ended.”