Elwood Hughes Edwards Jr. (November6, 1949November5, 2024) was an American voice actor. He was best known as the voice of various soundmarks for the Internet service provider

America Online AOL (formerly a company known as AOL Inc. and originally known as America Online) is an American web portal and online service provider based in New York City, and a brand marketed by Yahoo! Inc. (2017–present), Yahoo! Inc. The service tra ...

which he first recorded in 1989. This included AOL's trademark "You've got mail" greeting.

Career

Edwards started in radio while in high school, in 1964. After high school, he continued into television, working as a live booth announcer. Despite some on-air work, including a car commercial, reporting news or sports, and a short stint as a weatherman, Edwards focused mainly on off-camera work, with work ranging from graphics to operating cameras. He later worked at

WKYC WKYC (channel 3) is a television station in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, affiliated with NBC and owned by Tegna Inc. Its studios are located on Tom Beres Way (a section of Lakeside Avenue in Downtown Cleveland named after the station's lo ...

Cleveland Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located along the southern shore of Lake Erie, it is situated across the Canada–U.S. maritime border and approximately west of the Ohio-Pennsylvania st ...

, until his retirement in 2016. In 1989, Edwards's wife, an employee for online service Q-Link, overheard company CEO

Steve Case Stephen McConnell Case (born August 21, 1958) is an American businessman, investor, and philanthropist best known as the former chief executive officer and chairman of America Online (AOL). Case joined AOL's predecessor company, Quantum Compu ...

describe how he wanted to add a voice to its user interface. She recommended Edwards for the job, and he was paid $200 () to record the lines. In October, his voice premiered on AOL's new program. His greetings include "Welcome", "You've got mail", "You've got pictures", "You've got voicemail", "File's done", and "Goodbye", all recorded in his own living room on a

cassette deck A cassette deck is a type of tape machine for playing and recording audio cassettes that does not have a built-in power amplifier or speakers, and serves primarily as a Transport (recording), transport. It can be a part of an automotive entertai ...

. His voice also appeared in a 2000 episode of ''

The Simpsons ''The Simpsons'' is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening and developed by Groening, James L. Brooks and Sam Simon for the Fox Broadcasting Company. It is a Satire (film and television), satirical depiction of American life ...

'', " Little Big Mom" (where he provided the voice of a virtual doctor, saying "You've got

leprosy Leprosy, also known as Hansen's disease (HD), is a Chronic condition, long-term infection by the bacteria ''Mycobacterium leprae'' or ''Mycobacterium lepromatosis''. Infection can lead to damage of the Peripheral nervous system, nerves, respir ...

"), and in advertising for the 1998 film ''

You've Got Mail ''You've Got Mail'' is a 1998 American romantic comedy film directed by Nora Ephron, and starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan alongside Parker Posey, Jean Stapleton, Dave Chappelle, Steve Zahn, and Greg Kinnear. Inspired by the 1937 Hungarian ...

''. After retirement, he sold personalized

WAV Waveform Audio File Format (WAVE, or WAV due to its filename extension; pronounced or ) is an audio file format standard for storing an audio bitstream on personal computers. The format was developed and published for the first time in 1991 ...

files through his website. On the March4, 2015, episode of ''

The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon ''The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon'' is an American late-night talk show hosted by actor and comedian Jimmy Fallon that airs on NBC. The show premiered on February 17, 2014, and is produced by Broadway Video and Universal Television. It i ...

'', Edwards appeared on screen to read phrases which were meant to be humorous. As of November 2016, Edwards was seen on

Instagram Instagram is an American photo sharing, photo and Short-form content, short-form video sharing social networking service owned by Meta Platforms. It allows users to upload media that can be edited with Social media camera filter, filters, be ...

and

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

working as an

Uber Uber Technologies, Inc. is an American multinational transportation company that provides Ridesharing company, ride-hailing services, courier services, food delivery, and freight transport. It is headquartered in San Francisco, California, a ...

driver. On September16, 2019, Edwards and his AOL story were featured on the podcast ''

Twenty Thousand Hertz ''Twenty Thousand Hertz'' is a podcast about "the world’s most recognizable and interesting sounds". Episodes are published every other Wednesday . Overview The show's title refers to highest frequency that can be perceived within the human ...

'' in an episode entitled "You've Got Mail". In October 2022, Edwards appeared in a television ad for the

e-commerce E-commerce (electronic commerce) refers to commercial activities including the electronic buying or selling products and services which are conducted on online platforms or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile co ...

platform

Shopify Shopify Inc., stylized as ''shopify'', headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, operates an e-commerce platform for retail point-of-sale systems that offers payments, marketing, shipping, inventory management, transaction management, and customer eng ...

, in which he announced "You've got sales" to sellers on the platform.

Personal life and death

Elwood Hughes Edwards Jr. was born in

Glen Burnie, Maryland Glen Burnie is an unincorporated town and census-designated place (CDP) in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, United States. It is a suburb of Baltimore. The population was 72,891 at the 2020 census. History In 1812, Elias Glenn, a district attorn ...

, on November6, 1949, and grew up primarily in North Carolina, first in Beaufort and then in

New Bern New Bern, formerly Newbern, is a city in Craven County, North Carolina, United States, and its county seat. It had a population of 31,291 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It is located at the confluence of the Neuse River, Neuse a ...

. He graduated from New Bern High School in 1967. Edwards was a Baptist and was a minister at one point. Edwards married Betsy Fulcher, and they had two children before divorcing. He then married Karen Adams, whom he had met online through a Q-Link dating service; their marriage also ended in divorce. Edwards died of complications from a

stroke Stroke is a medical condition in which poor cerebral circulation, blood flow to a part of the brain causes cell death. There are two main types of stroke: brain ischemia, ischemic, due to lack of blood flow, and intracranial hemorrhage, hemor ...

at his home in

New Bern, North Carolina New Bern, formerly Newbern, is a city in Craven County, North Carolina, United States, and its county seat. It had a population of 31,291 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It is located at the confluence of the Neuse River, Neuse a ...

, on November5, 2024, one day before his 75th birthday.

Other jobs

* News graphics supervisor,

WKYC-TV WKYC (channel 3) is a television station in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, affiliated with NBC and owned by Tegna Inc. Its studios are located on Tom Beres Way (a section of Lakeside Avenue in Downtown Cleveland named after the station's longt ...

* General manager, KVVV 1998 * Production manager/senior director, WCTI-TV * Announcer/director, WNBE-TV *

driver

References

External links

*
You've got mail
soundmark at the

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is an agency in the U.S. Department of Commerce that serves as the national patent office and trademark registration authority for the United States. The USPTO's headquarters are in Alex ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Edwards, Elwood 1949 births 2024 deaths 20th-century American male actors 20th-century Baptist ministers from the United States AOL people American male voice actors Baptists from North Carolina People from New Bern, North Carolina People from Orrville, Ohio People from Glen Burnie, Maryland Male actors from North Carolina