Randy Wolfe

Randy Wolfe, a Mount Airy, North Carolina, native and long-time producer for CBS News, died June 11, 2021, at Georgetown University Hospital in Washington, D.C. He was admitted to the hospital on June 7 with severe pneumonia after suffering the ravages of Parkinson’s disease and neuropathy for several years. He was 69. He is remembered by his friends and family as an outstanding journalist and a gentle soul whose knowledge of American politics was encyclopedic, as was his knowledge of Van Morrison’s music. John Randolph Wolfe was born in Mount Airy on February 20, 1952, to John and Eulala Wolfe, both of whom preceded him in death. Randy was a man of many talents and interests. As a student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, he was very involved in campus politics and also in the development of the campus radio station, then known as WCAR. Randy is also considered one of the founding fathers in helping to establish WXYC-FM at UNC, which became the first radio station to be streamed over the internet.  In his junior year at UNC, he ran for student body president with a slogan that reflected his sly sense of humor: “There’s a Wolfe at the door – let him in!” After studying journalism at UNC, Randy worked for several radio and television stations in North Carolina, including WBAG in Burlington, WKIX in Raleigh, WTOB in Winston-Salem and WFMY-TV in Greensboro. From WFMY he moved to KTVI-TV in St. Louis, Missouri, as a news producer, and from there to CBS News, where he was a top-tier news producer for two decades including working on the “CBS Evening News With Dan Rather” during that program’s strongest years His career with CBS News took him to Washington, Chicago, London, El Salvador and numerous locations for news stories in the United States and abroad. Randy was in Berlin, Germany, for CBS News to witness and cover the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989. It was one of his proudest career moments. He also covered the Bosnian conflict for CBS News in the early 1990s. In Washington, Randy covered the Supreme Court and Congress, which put him in his element, in the midst of American politics. After leaving CBS News he worked for NBC News Channel in Washington. Randy returned to Mount Airy for a time, running for a seat in the North Carolina House of Representatives in 2010. He later moved back to Washington, where he spent his final years residing in an assisted-living facility as he struggled with Parkinson’s disease and neuropathy. He is survived by his sister, Pamala Wolfe Wannamaker and her husband, James Michael Wannamaker; and nephew John Carson Wannamaker, all of High Point, North Carolina; niece Elizabeth Blair Archila and her husband Jorge Rafael Archila, and their daughter Audrey Elizabeth Archila, all of Raleigh. A graveside service will be held on Thursday, July 1, 2021 at 2:00 PM at God's Acre (Grave Moravian Church) 1401 North Main St., Mount Airy, NC 27030. Memorials in memory of Randy Wolfe may be made to the Moravian Ministries Foundation for the Margaret Leonard Scholarship Fund, and sent to Grace Moravian Church, 1401 North Main Street, Mount Airy, NC 27030. To send flowers to Randy's family, please visit our floral store.