Manolo Reyes

Manolo de Jesus Reyes Xiques J.D. (July 29, 1924 – January 3, 2008) was a Cuban-American Spanish-language television news broadcaster in Miami, Florida. Reyes became a television news pioneer in the 1960s when he began one of South Florida's first Spanish-language newscasters. His first 15-minute news show, News En Español, debuted on WTVJ on August 28, 1960 at 6:45 AM, at a time when Spanish-language broadcasts were rare in the Miami metropolitan area. His original broadcasts were aimed at making news accessible to the growing Spanish-speaking, Miami-based Cuban exile community.

Reyes was born in Cuba, where he worked as a child actor, radio performer and singer. He obtained a law degree from the University of Havana before moving to the United States.

Manolo Reyes, who resided in the Miami area in the 1950s and 1960s, realized that there were no television news shows aimed at the growing Cuban exile community, especially after the Communist takeover of Cuba by Fidel Castro in the Cuban Revolution.

Despite his limited English, Reyes pitched his idea to the founder of WTVJ, Mitchell Wolfson, and Miami television pioneer Ralph Renick. Renick and Woflson agreed to let Reyes tape a test show. The station had to have the test show critiqued by a University of Miami linguistics professor because no one at WTVJ (Channel 4) spoke Spanish at the time.

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