“The Reader’s Notebook” is a daily radio feature using general interest pieces, often of literary or historic significance. Topics will also include science, technology, philosophy, folklore and the arts.
The series is written and hosted by J. D. Reeder, a retired educator, historian, avid reader and regular writer, director, and performer with the Morehead Theatre Guild.
The segments air weekdays (M-TH) at 9:06 a.m., 12:20 p.m. and 5:44 p.m. Each segment will include vignettes about writers, artists and other noteworthy people whose birthdays or other significant events coincide with the date of the program.
Occasionally, word and phrase origins will be explored, often with a Kentucky connection or include poems and excerpts from other writings associated with the subject of the day. Each episode will conclude with the phrase: “Write it on your heart that every day is the best day of the year,” a quotation from noted American poet and essayist, Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Theme music for "The Reader's Notebook" provided by Todd Kozikowski ("Shadows of the Moon"/1997).
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Jean-Antoine Houdon was a French neoclassical sculptor. Houdon is famous for his portrait busts and statues of philosophers, inventors and political figures of the Enlightenment
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Tobias George Smollett was a Scottish novelist, surgeon, critic and playwright. He was best known for picaresque novels such as The Adventures of Roderick Random, The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle and The Expedition of Humphry Clinker, which influenced later novelists, including Charles Dickens.
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Sir Michael Caine is an English retired actor. Known for his distinctive Cockney accent, he has appeared in more than 160 films over a career spanning eight decades and is considered a British film icon.
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William Hall Macy Jr. is an American actor. His film career has been built on appearances in small, independent films, though he has also appeared in mainstream films. His starring roles include those in Fargo, Boogie Nights, Mystery Men, Jurassic Park III, Cellular, Bobby, Wild Hogs, and Shorts.
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Sir Richard Steele was an Anglo-Irish writer, playwright, and politician, remembered as co-founder, with his friend Joseph Addison, of the magazine The Spectator.
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Whitcomb L. Judson was an American machine salesman, mechanical engineer and inventor. He received thirty patents over a sixteen-year career, fourteen of which were on pneumatic street railway innovations.
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Savinien de Cyrano de Bergerac was a French novelist, playwright, epistolarian, and duelist. A bold and innovative author, his work was part of the libertine literature of the first half of the 17th century.
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Benjamin Franklin Norris Jr. was an American journalist and novelist during the Progressive Era, whose fiction was predominantly in the naturalist genre. His notable works include McTeague: A Story of San Francisco, The Octopus: A Story of California and The Pit.
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A leap year is a calendar year that contains an additional day compared to a common year. The 366th day (or 13th month) is added to keep the calendar year synchronized with the astronomical year or seasonal year.
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Samuel Joel "Zero" Mostel was an American actor, comedian, and singer. He is best known for his portrayal of comic characters such as Tevye on stage in Fiddler on the Roof.