Detroit Radio: After 30-Years, WWJ's Vickie Thomas to Retire

Award-winning longtime WWJ-AM 950 AM reporter Vickie Thomas is retiring this month, she announced Friday on Twitter.

"It's been an amazing ride working with the outstanding professionals at WWJ ... the BEST news team around!" the broadcaster tweeted. "I've truly been blessed!!"

The Detroit News reports Thomas, the city beat reporter at WWJ since 1991, said her last day on air is April 29 but she plans to continue a weekly podcast, "Black Business Minute."

After 30 years @WWJ950, I am #retiring but you'll still be able to hear my #BlackBusinessMinute each week. It's been an amazing ride working with the outstanding professionals at WWJ...the BEST news team around! I've truly been blessed!! Here's one of my favs from a career day:

— Vickie Thomas (@VickiethomasWWJ) April 16, 2021

Vicki Thomas

During her career she earned honors from groups including the Detroit Press Foundation, the Michigan Association of Broadcasters, the Michigan Associated Press and the National Association of Black Journalists, according to the Michigan Journalism Hall of Fame, into which she was inducted in 2019.

Thomas is a past president of the National Association of Black Journalists' Detroit chapter, where as vice president she started a scholarship and internship program for college students interested in broadcast news, according to the group. 

She also served on the NABJ national board and was instrumental in helping the group bring its annual convention and career fair to Detroit in 2018 for the first time since 1992, the Michigan Journalism Hall of Fame reported.

In 2020, Thomas received a lifetime achievement award from the Detroit chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.