Meet The Team

Joel Daly

Joel Daly co-anchored ABC 7's 4 p.m. newscast, alongside Linda Yu, until he retired in 2005. He now serves as a legal analyst for ABC 7 News.

Daly joined ABC 7 Chicago in 1967. With his late co-anchor, Fahey Flynn, his unique reporting style pioneered the most-copied news format in the United States. In his 35 years as an anchor and reporter, Daly has covered major news events in the Philippines, Southeast Asia and the Middle East, in addition to local and national election coverage.

Before he came to ABC 7, Daly sojourned in Cleveland, Ohio, at WJW-TV (1964-67) and at WEWS-TV (1960-64). His broadcasting career began in Idaho at the age of 17.

Inducted into the Chicago Journalism Hall of Fame in 2003 as a "living legend," Daly has won five Chicago Emmy Awards, including a citation for nightly commentary, a citation for "highlighting the genuine humanity and humor in the day's happenings," and an award for excellence in writing. He received the Herman Kogan Award from the Chicago Bar Association and the NATAS Silver Circle Award. His commentaries were also honored with the 1973 Liberty Bell award from the Chicago Bar Association and the 1974 Human Relations award from the American Jewish Congress.

In addition to his role as newscaster, Daly is active in music and theater. He appears yearly in the "Christmas Spirits" revue of the Chicago Bar Association, regularly performs a musical tribute to Roy Rogers with his new band, "Prairie Moon," and is part of a repertory company that regularly produces radio plays at the Museum of Broadcasting. He was critically lauded for his 1994 role as Atticus Finch in "To Kill a Mockingbird" at Chicago's Wisdom Bridge Theater. Daly also shone in "Darrow," a one-man play about the legendary Clarence Darrow, and as the lead character in William Kennedy's "Grand View" at the Pegasus Theater.

Daly serves on the Board of Directors of the Clinic for Elderly and Disabled, the Board of Governors for Chicago-Kent College of Law, and is the Chairman of the Student Affairs Committee at Chicago-Kent College of Law. He is also a member of the Chicago National Association of Television Arts and Sciences.

Daly graduated magna cum laude from Yale University in 1956, earning a B.A. degree in English. Thirty years later, in 1988, he graduated with honors from IIT-Chicago-Kent College of Law. Daly, now a practicing trial lawyer, is a member of the Bar both in Illinois and Wisconsin.

He is married, has two grown children, and resides in a southwest suburb.

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