Full Name: <\/strong>William James O’Reilly Jr.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Career: <\/strong>TV Host, Political Commentator, Author<\/p>\n\n\n\n Birthdate: <\/strong>Sep 10, 1949<\/p>\n\n\n\n High School:<\/strong> Chaminade High School<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Yearbooks:<\/strong> 1965<\/a> | 1966<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Yearbook photos of Bill O’Reilly from Chaminade High School<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Bill O\u2019Reilly is a conservative media pundit most well known for his decades long tenure as a media personality on Fox News, hosting The O\u2019Reilly Factor, which was the highest rated cable news show for over 16 years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Justin Hoch, CC BY 2.0 <https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons<\/p>\n\n\n\n Since departing from the news station in 2017, the political commentator has continued to host his own podcast, No Spin News, that was eventually aired on Newsmax and The First news stations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Bill had an extensive, high-quality education through private Catholic schools in his childhood and prominent universities for college. <\/p>\n\n\n\n O\u2019Reilly spent his younger years at St. Brigid School<\/a> in Westbury, New York. During elementary school, O\u2019Reilly shared openly in his book A Bold Fresh Piece of Humanity<\/a>, that it was at this Catholic school that his intellectual mind began to form. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cin my [early] life\u2026 It was the diminutive, intense Sister Mary Lurana who ruled, at least in the third-grade class where I was held captive. Already, I had barely survived my first two years at St. Brigid’s because I was, well, a little nitwit. Not satisfied with memorizing The Baltimore Catechism’s fine prose\u2026 I was constantly annoying my [schoolmates] and, of course, the no-nonsense Sister Lurana. With sixty overactive students in her class, she was understandably short on patience. For survival, she had also become quick on the draw. Then it happened. One day I blurted out some dumb remark and Sister Lurana was on me like a panther. Her black habit blocked out all distractions as she leaned down, looked me in the eye, and uttered words I have never forgotten: \u2018William, you are a bold, fresh piece of humanity.\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n He continued his education at St. Brigid for junior high as well before starting at a new school on Long Island for high school. <\/p>\n\n\n\n While Bill was insistent that he wanted to attend public high school with his friends at W. Tresper Clarke High School, his dad ultimately made him attend a private Catholic school, Chaminade High School<\/a> in Mineola, Long Island, New York. <\/p>\n\n\n\n He played Little League baseball and was the varsity<\/a> hockey team goalie at Chaminade and put pride into being a jock. <\/p>\n\n\n\n During high school, he hilariously crossed paths with a young Billy Joel<\/a>, who also resided on Long Island during his childhood. Bill described him<\/a> as a \u201choodlum\u201d and shared the following about his fellow celebrity, \u201c[Billy] was in the Hicksville section [of Long Island]\u2014the same age as me\u2014and he was a hood. He used to slick it [his hair] . . his guys would smoke and this and that, and we were more jocks.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bill furthered his education at Marist College<\/a> in Poughkeepsie, NY, where he punted for the club football team, wrote for the school newspaper The Circle, and majored in history. He also spent a semester abroad at Queen of Mary College at The University of London. He was an honors student at Marist<\/a> and graduated in 1971, while playing semi-pro baseball for the New York Monarchs. <\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Before going back to college for his masters, Bill moved to Miami, Florida and worked at Monsignor Pace High School<\/a> for two years teaching history and English. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1973, he decided to go back to college, pursuing a masters in broadcast journalism<\/a> at Boston University<\/a>. Fittingly, he got involved in local journalism as a reporter and columnist for a variety of local news weeklies and newspapers such as the Boston Phoenix and BU\u2019s own student newspaper, the Daily Free Press. He also interned at WBZ-TV. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Eventually, O\u2019Reilly earned another masters degree from Harvard<\/a> in 1996, a masters in public policy from theIvy League<\/a> School\u2019s John F. Kennedy School of Government. <\/p>\n\n\n\n See page for author, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bill O’Reilly at the World Affairs Council of Philadelphia.jpg: World Affairs Council of Philadelphiaderivative work: Karppinen, CC BY 3.0 <https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons<\/p>\n\n\n\n While you probably recognize Bill today from his decades as a cable news titan, you might be wondering what he looked like young. Compare this high school photo from Bill O\u2019Reilly\u2019s yearbook compared to a modern photo. <\/p>\n\n\n\n O\u2019Reilly<\/a> quickly made a name for himself in local broadcast news in 1973, kicking off his news anchor career at WNEP-TV in Scranton, PA in where he was also a weatherman. <\/p>\n\n\n\n He then moved on to WFAA-TV in Dallas, TX, where he received a Dallas Press Club Award for his top notch investigative reporting. At his next station, KMGH-TV in Denver, he earned a local Emmy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n O\u2019Reilly also worked at WFSB in Hartford, CT and then anchored the program 7:30 Magazine at WCBS-TV, where he won another Emmy Award.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bill O\u2019Reilly<\/a> moved to national news as a correspondent at CBS News in 1982, covering wars in both El Salvador (on location) and the Falkland Islands. <\/p>\n\n\n\n He returned to local news at WNEV-TV in Boston after his stint at CBS, on a wide-range of shows as a weekend anchor, reporter, and eventually the host of its New England Afternoon news magazine. <\/p>\n\n\n\n After his extensive local broadcast journalism career, Bill began working at ABC News in 1986, hosting day time news briefs and as a reporter for a variety of ABC national news programs like Good Morning America, World News Tonight, and Nightline. <\/p>\n\n\n\n After 3 years at ABC, he went on to host Inside Edition that was syndicated by King World nationally until 1995. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1996, he was hired by Fox News<\/a> to anchor The O\u2019Reilly Report, which was eventually renamed to the O\u2019Reilly Factor. For over 14 years, it had the highest ratings of any 24-hour cable news TV shows. His opinion-oriented approach to cable news has since became a staple at Fox and other news stations. In 2017, Bill O\u2019Reilly stepped down from Fox News. <\/p>\n\n\n\n DoD photo by MASTER SGT. James M. Bowman, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons<\/p>\n\n\n\n After departing from Fox News, O\u2019Reilly launched a podcast called No Spin News and Analysis<\/a> in 2017, which went on to be aired on Newsmax TV<\/a> in 2020. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Bill<\/a> was born on September 10, 1949 to mother Winifred Angela O\u2019Reilly and father William James O\u2019Reilly. Winifred was from Brooklyn, NY and William was from Teaneck, NJ.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At the time of his birth, the family lived in Teaneck, before moving to Levittown on Long Island in 1951. <\/p>\n\n\n\n He has one sister, Janet O\u2019Reilly<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Bill O\u2019Reilly was married to Maureen McPhilmy<\/a> from 1996 to 2011. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The two met in 1992 at a party. They were married at St. Brigid Parish in Westbury, NY (where he previously attended elementary school!) and have two children together, Madeline<\/a> and Spencer O\u2019Reilly<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n He and Maureen divorced in 2011 after getting separated in 2010. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Check out the Classmates\u00ae yearbook collection<\/a> to see photos of many of your favorite celebrities from throughout the decades. With over 480,000 yearbooks in the archive, you can even search to see if you and your family\/friend\u2019s yearbooks are available as well. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Get started now! Register for free on the Classmates website. Then upgrade to CM+<\/a> to view high resolution digital photos in the entire yearbook collection. <\/p>\n\n\n\n All product names, logos, brands, trademarks, and copyrights are property of their respective owners.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Related Celeb Yearbook Blogs<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n Source: Wikipedia<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" You likely know Bill O\u2019Reilly from his extensive career at Fox News and continued political coverage from his own \u201cNo Spin News\u201d podcast since his Fox departure. But what is his educational background that shaped the man we all know today? See photos of a young Bill O\u2019Reilly in high school and get to know […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":2087,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-celebrity"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2029"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2029\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8580,"href":"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2029\/revisions\/8580"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Bill](\"https:\/\/aboutclassmates.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/young-bill-oreilly.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"Bill](\"https:\/\/aboutclassmates.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/bill-oreilly-high-school.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"Bill](\"https:\/\/aboutclassmates.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/bill-oreilly-teenager.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"Chaminade](\"https:\/\/aboutclassmates.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/ChaminadeHS-1965-YBcover.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"Chaminade](\"https:\/\/aboutclassmates.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/ChaminadeHS-1966-YBcover.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\nWho is Bill O\u2019Reilly?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
What Should You Know About Bill O’Reilly?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Bill O\u2019Reilly\u2019s Education Background <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Elementary & Middle School<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
High School<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
College <\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Undergrad<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Masters Programs<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Bill O\u2019Reilly: Then Vs. Now<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/image-1.jpeg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/image-2.jpeg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nCareer <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Early Days in Broadcasting <\/h3>\n\n\n\n
National News Career<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.classmates.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/image-3.jpeg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nCareer After Fox<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Family <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Parents & Sibling <\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Ex-Wife & Children<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Explore the Celebrity Yearbook Archive <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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