Journalist Sarah Koenig rocketed to fame as executive producer of Serial, an ongoing podcast that uncovered new details in the “cold case” of a murdered girl. Koenig graduated from the University of Chicago in 1990 and began reporting for the East Hampton Star in New York. She worked for both ABC News and the New York Times in Russia, then covered State House politics for the Concord Monitor and the Baltimore Sun. In 2004 she became a producer on This American Life, winning a Peabody Award in 2006 for her work on “Habeas Schmabeas,” an episode covering Guantanamo detainees. In 2013 she began work on a spinoff from This American Life called Serial. The podcast, which first aired in 2014, was unusual both for its long-form, serialized reporting and for the fact that the producers and reporters continued to uncover new facts as the series went on, making it impossible to predict how the show would end. Serial joined the New York Times Company in 2020 and as of 2023 new seasons continue to air on Spotify. Serial won a Peabody Award in 2015 for its contribution toward bringing podcasting into the mainstream. In April of 2015, TIME Magazine included Koenig on its list of “The 100 Most Influential People.”