Though Al Roker is one of the most successful weathermen in history, his path to stardom was not an easy one. Roker has experienced some difficult times, including facing racism and prejudice in the workplace, which meant he felt he had to work much harder than his white colleagues.
“When I was coming up, there were no jobs that I wouldn’t do when I was starting out in television,” he told The Hollywood Reporter, also referring to a very frank conversation he had with his dad, who told him, “‘It’s not a fair world out there. You are going to have to work twice as hard and be twice as good to get half as far as the white kid next to you.’”
The star also got candid about his experience in his 2020 book, “You Look So Much Better in Person,” where he recalled a racially aggravated incident that occurred on air while he was working in Cleveland. He elaborated about the incident on “Today,” recalling how a colleague was once hit with a newspaper by a Black man. “The next day we get on the air and his wife, Mona, is about to introduce me, and he goes, ‘Mona, before you introduce Al, Al I don’t know if you know this, but last night, one of your people attacked me.”’ Roker recalled being horrified by the incident, before retorting, “‘Doug why would a weatherman attack you?’ And then just went into the weather.”