After seventeen years on the iconic morning news show Today, anchor Hoda Kotb celebrated her last day—and a Monday morning without 3 am alarms. Kotb spent her previous morning anchoring the show alongside her friends and coworkers on Friday, January 10.
“I decided that this is the right time for me to move on,” Kotb said of her decision to leave the program. “Then I thought about. Obviously, I had my kiddos late in life, and I thought that they deserve a bigger piece of my time pie that I have. I feel like we only have a finite amount of time.”
Kotb is the adoptive mother of two daughters, a process she documented while working on air at Today. During her final broadcast, her daughters Haley and Hope made a special appearance at the late hour of the show, joined by Kermit the Frog, who serenaded them with a live rendition of “Rainbow Connection.”
The “Hoda-bration” kicked off early Friday morning, with Kotb’s co-anchor Savannah Guthrie tearing up just minutes into the broadcast. The plaza was filled with some of the anchor’s biggest fans, many of whom arrived hours before the 7 am start time to ensure good spots. She received special messages from many collaborators and coworkers from years past, including Dateline’s Keith Morrison, Kristin Chenoweth, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Gayle King.
The Today team had nothing but praise to share with Kotb. “Hoda’s everyone’s sister and she’s a sister to me,” Guthrie gushed as she recalled stories of their early mornings in the makeup chairs together. “Hoda has such incredible interviews because she reaches [across you] with her eyes and her heart,” she added.
“Hoda’s always been able to take the work seriously without taking herself too seriously,” Craig Melvin, who will be replacing Kotb as anchor, added. “Hoda doesn’t have interviews; she has conversations.”
“I think everything she does, she leads with her heart,” weatherman Al Roker continued, recounting how she visited him daily in the hospital when he was sick.
Kotb was joined by former co-host Kathie Lee Gifford, who held a toast to her friend to conclude the iconic wine-filled segment. Gifford described her as “sunshine in a bottle” and wished that Kotb may “walk into the most joyful, prosperous, and purposeful” time of her life. Not a dry eye remained after the celebration of Kotb, the iconic and positive first face millions of Americans woke up to each morning.
