Dayton native interviews Oprah for TV special

Then a low-on-the-totem -pole gift services worker at Winfrey’s Harpo Productions, Brooks wrote a letter asking Oprah if she could join her on a visit to the school in South Africa.

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Brooks said her father, former area resident Gary Brooks, instilled ambition and other values in her, but that "yes" from Oprah closed the gap.

"When Oprah said 'yes' to my letter, something was reconfigured in my mind,"  Brooks said. "It just totally expanded my realm of possibility."

Now a correspondent and the co-anchor of "Nightline on Fusion" for the Fusion network, Brooks asks the former talk show host why she said yes as part of her Fusion network special "O Girls."

“She said she could feel the passion in the words I was writing,” Brooks, who worked as a production assistant while in Africa,  said. “She could tell that it was super genuine and I meant it.”

Brooks' documentary recorded at the Academy and at Winfrey's home premiere at 8 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 18 on the network.

Fusion is not broadcast on Time Warner/Spectrum, but can be found on other services.

It will eventually be added to FUSION.net, Brooks said.

Now based in Miami, Florida, the graduate of Northmont High School, Northwestern University and Columbia University  said O Girls tells the story of some of the school girls she met on that first time and others.

They called her “Sis Kim.”

“They are really incredible women. I feel grateful they want me in their lives,” Brooks said. “They remain my little baby girls.”

Gary Brooks now lives in the Cleveland area, but Brooks said her mother, Judy Brooks, and other family members reside in the Dayton area.

She said she hopes the viewers are uplifted by the special. 
She said she feels likes she's come full circle from a young woman working for Winfrey's gift services to a correspondent interviewing her.

“For me it was this unbelievable opportunity to tell stories of incredibly inspiring women and women of color,” she said.