(Photo by: Douglas Gorenstein/NBCU Photo Bank)
The man behind AOL’s iconic “You’ve Got Mail” message died earlier this week.
Elwood Edwards, 74, is thought to have passed away due to complications related to a stroke he suffered last year, the Associated Press reports. He lived much of his life in Cleveland, Ohio, and worked as a graphic designer, cameraman, and TV station assistant.
He was reportedly convinced to record the iconic vocal snippet by his wife, Karen Edwards, who worked at a company called Quantum Computer Services, which would later become AOL. In a 2016 interview, he said he recorded the iconic phrase in his living room on a cassette deck. His daughter, Heather Edwards, told the AP that his bosses were so impressed by his first take of the phrase that “they didn’t have him go in a recording booth.”
Despite the fame the phrase would later attract, Edwards claims he only ever made $200 from his voice-over work for AOL.
News of his passing may mean less to younger millennials and members of Gen Z. AOL, then branded as America Online, was at one point the largest internet service provider in the US in the late 90's. It then rapidly declined in popularity, which some have chalked up to the rise of low-cost broadband providers and the decline of dial-up.
AOL merged with media giant Time Warner in 2000 in a $183 billion deal, which was one of the largest in corporate history at the time. The brand is now owned by tech giant Yahoo.
Edwards managed to parlay his AOL fame into some notable entries into popular culture, including voice acting in an episode of The Simpsons and an appearance on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon in 2015. The phrase “You’ve Got Mail” also inspired a 1998 romantic comedy film of the same name, starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan.