How Old Is Vanna White: About Her Age, Early Life, Career And Net Worth

How Old Is Vanna White?

How Old Is Vanna White

How old is Vanna White: She is 66 years as of 2023. Vanna Marie White was born on February 18, 1957.

Vanna White is a popular television personality and game show hostess from the US. The majority of people have come to know her as a co-host of Wheel of Fortune since 1982. She started modeling and competed in Miss Georgia USA in 1978 while she worked toward a career in fashion.

In addition to her work on Wheel of Fortune, she has been in a lot of films and television shows in supporting or recurring roles. The 1987 autobiography Vanna Speaks is another work by her. Along with these activities, White also makes real estate investments, owns the yarn business Vanna’s Choice, and contributes to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

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Early Life

Vanna Marie Rosich was born on February 18, 1957, in Conway, South Carolina. She is the offspring of Miguel and Joan Rosich. Her parents divorced when she was a newborn, and her father swiftly fled the home. Vanna took her mother’s last name following her eventual second marriage, Herbert White, Jr.

She attended high school and was raised in North Myrtle Beach. She moved to Atlanta to attend the Atlanta School of Fashion & Design. While still a college student, she participated in the Miss Georgia USA pageant in 1978. She moved to Los Angeles in 1979 to seek a career as an actress. In June 1980, she participated in “The Price Is Right.”

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Career

How Old Is Vanna White

 

Wheel Of Fortune

In the middle of the 1970s, Merv Griffin, the creator of the game show “Wheel of Fortune,” developed the concept while playing hangman with his family on a road trip. With the assistance of the executives at his production company, they adapted the hangman to create “Wheel of Fortune.”

On January 6, 1975, it was first broadcast. At first, the host was Chuck Woolery. In 1981, Woolery was let go after asking Merv for a substantial pay raise, which he refused. When Woolery’s contract was not renewed, Merv made the decision to bring in Pat Sajak, an NBC Los Angeles weatherman, to take Woolery’s position.

The Wheel of Fortune’s initial hostess was Susan Stafford. Stafford participated in the program from its inception in 1975 until her departure for humanitarian work in October 1982.

For her replacement, more than 200 of LA’s most gorgeous and successful models applied. Finally, it came down to these two ladies: Vicki McCarthy and Vanna White’s Playboy centerfold. You are aware that Vanna was employed. Vanna White debuted as the show’s permanent hostess on December 13, 1982. Since she has remained the main hostess of the show.

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Lawsuits

30 years of achievement haven’t been without their share of failures, though. Vanna appeared in Playboy Magazine in 1987, much to the surprise of everyday Americans. A photographer who had no connection to Playboy originally shot the images in 1982, a few months before she was offered the Wheel position.

Five years later, Hugh Hefner and Playboy bought the pictures from the photographer. When the photos were made public, Vanna sued Playboy for $5.2 million, claiming that doing so would  “tarnish her image as a modest, wholesome, attractive and innocent all-American girl.” and that the photos were never intended for wider dissemination.

She also personally sued Hefner in addition. According to Playboy, Vanna was aware that the magazine intended to publish the photographs and wanted them to be made public at the same time as her memoirs hit bookshelves. The case was finally thrown out.

After Samsung Electronics aired a commercial featuring a smiling robot replacing letters on a game show, Vanna successfully sued the company in 1993. White alleged that the company was using her likeness without her consent. Vanna miraculously won the claim after many obstacles and was awarded a $403,000 damage settlement.

Personal Life

How Old Is Vanna White

When Vanna White left North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, to pursue her dream of being famous, she had just $1,000. She worked as a server and a model while going to college in Atlanta and in her early years of pursuing fame and fortune in Los Angeles.

Vanna dated actor and former Chippendales dancer John Gibson in the 1980s while he was the centerfold of “Playgirl.” Sometime in the 1980s, they became engaged, but they were unable to wed since Gibson died in a plane crash in 1986.

In the summer of 1980, she made a quick trip back to South Carolina to support her mother through her battle with ovarian cancer. After a struggle, her mother lost the battle with the illness.

Vanna married restaurant owner George Santo Pietro in December 1990. Santo Pietro was born to a wealthy family in Beverly Hills. At the start of the 1980s, he launched his first restaurant.

After that, he established the well-known sushi restaurant Sushi-Ko, which is frequented by famous people. They have two children: a daughter named Giovanna, also known as Gigi, in 1997 and a son named Nicholas in 1994. White and Santo Pietro divorced in November 2002.

Her grandmother started teaching her how to crochet when she was five years old. She continues to like this activity. After mentioning her love of crocheting on “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson,” she received a call from Lion Brand Yarns. She and the business came into a contract so that she could create her own yarn brand, Vanna’s Choice.

White contributes to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. She has already donated $1.8 million to St. Jude’s. After leaving “Wheel of Fortune,” she plans to continue her philanthropic work.

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Net Worth

Vanna White receives an annual salary of $10 million from “Wheel of Fortune.” Every year, Pat Sajak makes $14 million. Four days a month, six Wheel of Fortune episodes are taped every day. There are two Thursday and two Friday tapes.

On the day of the video, they both come at 8:30 am, and they start shooting at noon. One audience watches three performances, then there is a lunch break. A second audience is watching three more recordings.

In other words, Vanna and Pat worked 48 days a year for $10 and $14 million in income, respectively. Each working day, Vanna White earns a total of $208,333.

Pat Sajak earns $312,000 a day. When broken down per show, Vanna White and Pat Sajak both earn $48,611 per episode. As we’ll see in the paragraph below, Vanna White’s income from Wheel of Fortune isn’t even her highest yearly salary.

Casino licensing revenue

Contrary to popular assumption, Vanna White doesn’t make the majority of her money from “Wheel of Fortune.” Vanna and Pat each make more money from the game show than they do from licensing their likenesses to slots in casinos.

Actually, Wheel of Fortune was the FIRST entertainment company to receive a slot machine license. In 1996, casinos in Las Vegas put in the first slots with the Wheel of Fortune logo.

They quickly proved their outstanding success and were granted licenses by casinos all over the world. Within a decade, the highest-grossing slot machines in most casinos reportedly belonged to the Wheel of Fortune franchise.

According to estimates, there are 20,000 “Wheel” slot machines spread across casino floors worldwide. In Las Vegas, the Wheel of Fortune slot machines alone generates more than $1 billion in gross revenue each year. The machines generate more than $2 billion worldwide.

Pat and Vanna each earn at least $15 million a year through the licensing of their unique likenesses and images for the slot machines. This income is mostly derived from a base royalty payment as well as from different incentives and appearance fees.

Annual salary

With her “Wheel of Fortune” salary and casino licensing income combined, Vanna White’s annual income comfortably exceeds $25 million per year.

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