Joan Lunden

About

Joan Lunden (born Joan Elise Blunden, September 19, 1950) is an American journalist, author, and television host. Lunden was the co-host of ABC’s Good Morning America from 1980 to 1997, and has authored over ten books. She has appeared on the Biography program and Biography Channel.
As of 2014, Lunden is a special correspondent for NBC’s Today. In 2021, Lunden became host of the public television program Second Opinion.

Joan Elise Blunden was born in Sacramento County, California, the daughter of Gladyce Lorraine (née Somervill) and Dr. Erle Murray Blunden. Her father was the chief of staff at American River Hospital and an amateur pilot with his own airport. She had a brother 8 months older than her named Jeff.
In 1964, her father and Dr. Byron E. Hall, a San Francisco physician, died in a plane crash in Malibu Canyon, California. They were returning from an American Cancer Society state board of directors meeting in Los Angeles.
Blunden graduated from Bella Vista High School in Fair Oaks, California at the age of 16 in 1967. She earned a Liberal Arts degree from California State University, Sacramento and studied abroad on World Campus Afloat (now Semester…