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53-625: In the early 19th century, the land on which Old Sturbridge Village stands was a farm owned by David Wight which included a sawmill, a gristmill, and a millpond. The millpond was dug in 1795 and still powers the mills today. In 1795, Wight's son went to Boston to conduct some business on behalf of his father. While in Boston, he bought tickets to the Harvard Lottery which was a fund-raising technique for Harvard College. He won $ 5,000 (equivalent to $ 97,404 in today's dollars). He gave his father money to pay off

106-604: A Dual Language School. Grades 6–12 are at Southbridge Middle School and Southbridge High School . Southbridge residents can also attend Bay Path Regional Vocational Technical High School in Charlton . In addition to the public schools, a parochial private school, Trinity Catholic Academy , serves Pre-K through eighth grade. On January 26, 2016, the Massachusetts Board of Elementary and Secondary Education placed Southbridge School District in state receivership. Southbridge

159-673: A Kickstarter fund to revive the show and materials. In under 12 hours the show had reached its $ 1 million goal. The new goal was to create an educational version for schools to use, free of cost to those schools in need, and help America get back to high literacy rates. They are also going to create a website for students to use to assist them with learning how to read. The following day, May 29, 2014, they reached $ 2   million (double their goal) at 1:15 pm. PST. The campaign raised $ 5,408,916 on Kickstarter with another $ 1   million from Family Guy creator/animator Seth MacFarlane and $ 70,000 raised via direct contributions. The grand total

212-541: A classroom version with the subscription fee waived for up to 13,000 disadvantaged classrooms. The effort met its initial fundraising goal of $ 1,000,000 in 11 hours, and ended a few days later at $ 5,408,916 from 105,857 backers. This campaign led to the launch of Skybrary by Reading Rainbow , a web-based expansion of the Reading Rainbow app experience. Due to a legal dispute, licensing of the Reading Rainbow brand

265-419: A different children's picture book , often narrated by a celebrity. The featured story's illustrations were scanned by the camera in a technique known as "iconographic animation" of each page shown in succession, although on certain occasions the shots would be animated. After the featured story, Burton visited many places relating to the episode's theme, often featuring interviews with guests. A notable example

318-571: A household in the city was $ 33,913, and the median income for a family was $ 41,863. Males had a median income of $ 36,008 versus $ 25,685 for females. The per capita income for the city was $ 18,514. About 13.0% of families and 15.4% of the population were below the poverty line, including 25.8% of those under age 18 and 10.2% of those age 65 or over. Southbridge is one of thirteen Massachusetts municipalities that have applied for, and been granted, city forms of government but wish to retain "The town of" in their official names The Southbridge Public Library

371-600: A new generation." WNED announced in November 2018 that research and development had begun on a new Reading Rainbow program thanks to a $ 200,000 grant from The John R. Oishei Foundation . Skybrary was acquired by Reading is Fundamental in March 2019. In December 2021, it was announced that the show would be revived as Reading Rainbow Live , an interactive version featuring multiple hosts, dubbed "The Rainbows". The series debuted on Looped on March 6, 2022. The photographing of

424-538: A reboot of The Electric Company . Former executive producer LeVar Burton announced on his Twitter feed on March 19, 2010, that "Reading Rainbow 2.0 is in the works." In 2011, WNED , the PBS affiliate in Buffalo, New York that owns the Reading Rainbow brand, licensed rights to the brand to Burton and his company, RRKidz. On March 4, 2012, he announced that it was the "last day of shooting before launch!" On June 13, 2012, in

477-558: A special presentation at Apple Inc 's annual World Wide Developers Conference , Burton and his business partner, Mark Wolfe, introduced the new Reading Rainbow iPad App. It became available in Apple's iTunes Store on June 20, 2012, and within 36 hours was the #1 educational app. In January 2014, the Reading Rainbow App surpassed 10M books read and video field trips watched by children in 18 months. On May 28, 2014, LeVar Burton started

530-419: Is frequently host to a naturalization ceremony on the fourth of July. In 2018, 152 new United States citizens were naturalized at Old Sturbridge Village. The Village is a popular wedding location. Old Sturbridge Village has been used as a set in many historical movies, TV shows, and documentaries, including Hawaii (1966) starring Julie Andrews , Reading Rainbow (1984), Glory (1989), Slavery and

583-469: Is served by Southbridge Municipal Airport (3B0), a public owned airport. Runway 02/20 has a 3501 x 75 feet asphalt surface. Reading Rainbow Reading Rainbow is an American educational children's television series that originally aired on PBS and afterward PBS Kids from July 11, 1983 to November 10, 2006, with reruns continuing to air until August 28, 2009. 155 30-minute episodes were produced over 23 seasons. Before its official premiere,

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636-509: Is the season 6 premiere episode, which featured the book The Bionic Bunny Show by Marc Brown and his wife Laurene, and included a behind-the-scenes look at the TV series Star Trek: The Next Generation , in which Burton was a main cast member. The last segment of each show, called Book Reviews, began with Burton's introductory catchphrase, "But you don't have to take my word for it," and featured children giving capsule reviews of books they liked. At

689-617: Is water. Southbridge is drained by the Quinebaug River . The principal road in Southbridge is Route 131 , known as Main Street through downtown and East Main Street past the "AO Rotary" and through Sandersdale, a village on the town's east side. North-south roads include Eastford Road and Elm Street ( Route 198 ), and Worcester Street-Mechanic Street-North Woodstock Road ( Route 169 ).Also Gulpwood road leads up to Charlton and Dudley Southbridge

742-499: The No Child Left Behind Act , this grant was focused much more narrowly toward programs that teach literacy skills, phonics, and spelling after 2005. Since Reading Rainbow was originally developed upon fostering a love of reading books, and not necessarily developing reading skills, the funding was redirected toward other programs, and led to the launch of new skills-based programming, like Super Why! , WordWorld , and

795-416: The Reading Rainbow catchphrase, "But you don't have to take my word for it," on his podcast. In October 2017, WNED and RRKidz settled out of court. While the exact terms were confidential, the result was that RRKidz was no longer a licensee of the Reading Rainbow brand. RRKidz was rebranded LeVar Burton Kids and its services (including Skybrary) removed references to Reading Rainbow. In addition, Burton

848-561: The Town of Southbridge . The area was initially inhabited by the Nipmuck and Mohegan tribes, with the Quinebaug River dividing their territories. As early as 1638, John Winthrop Jr. purchased Tantiusques , a tract for mining "lead" centered at what is now Leadmine Road in Sturbridge (it was thought at the time that where there was lead, there should be silver nearby). In fact the mineral deposit

901-515: The #1 most-downloaded educational app in the iTunes App Store. Developed by LeVar Burton and his company, RRKIDZ, the app allows children to read unlimited books, explore video field trips starring Burton, and earn rewards for reading. On the week of July 11, 2013, Reading Rainbow celebrated its 30th anniversary. In May 2014, a Kickstarter campaign was launched to raise funds to make the app available online and for Android , game consoles, smartphones, and other streaming devices along with creating

954-661: The 1930s they had been joined by Poles , Greeks , Italians and others. Southbridge has a long history of manufacturing optical products, earning it the unofficial title "Eye of the Commonwealth", in reference to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts . Under the Wells family, the American Optical Company ("AO") became the world's largest manufacturer of ophthalmic products, and at its height employed more than 6,000 people around

1007-542: The 1988–1989 school year, however, all kindergarten and 1st grade classes have been at Eastford Road School; all of grades 2–3 at Charlton Street School; and all of grades 4–5 at West Street School. In the mid 2010s Schools were shifted so that Eastford Road School housed Pre-K–1, and the Charlton Street School housed grades 2–5 in traditional neighborhood style, while the West Street School has been turned into

1060-805: The Fenno House, the Friends Meetinghouse, the Pliny Freeman House, the Printing Office, and the District School. On August 18, 1955, gale-force winds and a torrential downpour from Hurricane Diane created flood waters that broke dams in surrounding towns and flooded the Village, stranding 15 staff members. The Freeman Farmhouse was flooded and the covered bridge was swept off its foundation. Helicopters kept staff members supplied for three days until

1113-537: The Making of America (2005), and ‘’ Fetch! With Ruff Ruffman ’’ (2009). Filmmaker Ken Burns 's Hampshire College undergraduate thesis was an educational film made at Old Sturbridge Village called Working in Rural New England . Burns remains a patron and supporter of the museum. Old Sturbridge Village now awards a yearly "Ken Burns Lifetime Achievement Award" to individuals who have made a significant contribution to

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1166-633: The Village. They changed its name to Old Sturbridge Village and opened it on June 8, 1946. Attendance climbed, mostly through word of mouth. In a 1950 article in The Saturday Evening Post , the village was featured as "The Town That Wants to be Out of Date". By 1955, it acquired the Meetinghouse from the Fiskdale neighborhood of Sturbridge, the Salem Towne House from Charlton, Massachusetts ,

1219-516: The air was costly—an expensive move that producing station WNED decided not to make. Prior to the cancellation, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the U.S. Department of Education provided funds for the production of Reading Rainbow and a number of other PBS children's series throughout the early 2000s. The " Ready to Learn " grant was designed for television programming that encourage early childhood learning and development. However, under

1272-647: The books, Burton hosted video fieldtrips which connected kids to real world experiences at places like NASA HQ and Niagara Falls. In March 2016, RRKidz launched a new online educational service called Reading Rainbow Skybrary for Schools , which followed the same mission of the television series, while expanding to integrate into classroom curriculums. In August 2017, WNED filed a wide-ranging lawsuit against Burton and RRKidz that demanded Burton's company hand over administrative access to other websites and social media accounts. The lawsuit also sought to enjoin Burton from using

1325-474: The business, which continued to expand. In 1926, AB began to shop for antiques, and this influenced Cheney to collect early American timepieces and Channing to collect fine furniture. By the early 1930s, AB had more than 45 rooms full of antiques in his Southbridge home. The Wells family and others formed the Wells Historical Museum in 1935, gave it title to the various collections, and charged it with

1378-451: The care and exhibition of the artifacts. In July 1936, the museum's trustees met to determine how the collections would best be presented to the public. AB wanted to create a small cluster of buildings in a horseshoe around a common, but his son George B. proposed creating a live village with operating shops and a source of water power. Within a week of the meeting, the museum purchased David Wight's farm and soon after hired Malcolm Watkins as

1431-637: The center of town, with the town green as its focal point. Countryside consists of outlying farms and shops. The Mill Neighborhood features various commercial structures that rely upon the millpond for their power. The Center Village contains: The Countryside section contains: Mill Neighborhood features: Old Sturbridge Village has several buildings devoted to displaying their assorted collections of early American antiques. The Village hosts history- and seasonal-themed events such as homeschool days, kids' summer camps, Christmas by Candlelight, Fourth of July, Halloween, and Thanksgiving. Old Sturbridge Village

1484-546: The city was 81.2% White , 2.6% Black or African American , 0.5% Native American , 1.9% Asian , 0.0% Pacific Islander , and 2.9% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 26.6% of the population. There were 7,077 households, out of which 31.1% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 43.6% were married couples living together, 15.5% had a female householder with no husband present, and 36.1% were non-families. 29.7% of all households were made up of individuals, and 12.1% had someone living alone who

1537-411: The end credits having the full version of the 1983-1999 theme song (sung by the same singer—Tina Fabrique) --with some episodes (with the said song) repeating two or three times. On January 4, 1999, episodes began using a new live-action opening sequence and featured CGI in a new space-themed world, with a new arrangement of the original song by Steve Horelick and performed by Johnny Kemp . A third intro

1590-529: The end of almost every episode, Burton signed off by telling the audience "I'll see you next time", with a review of the books featured in that episode beginning in season 2. The series' pilot, which was created and produced in 1981 and aired as the show's 8th episode in 1983, featured the book Gila Monsters Meet You at the Airport by Marjorie Weinman Sharmat and was narrated by Doug Parvin. Producer Larry Lancit's daughters, Shaune and Caitlin, were often featured in

1643-689: The first curator of the museum, which they called Quinnebaug Village in honor of the river. Architect Arthur Shurcliff was called in to help lay out a suitable country landscape. By 1941, the Fitch House, the Miner Grant Store, and the Richardson House (now the Parsonage) were on the common and the Gristmill was in operation. After a pause for World War II, George B.'s wife Ruth became acting director of

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1696-587: The first settlers was Moses Marcy, who owned a home on the site of what is now Notre Dame church and was elected to Congress , and the Dennison family. Water power from the Quinebaug River made Southbridge a good location for sawmills and gristmills in the 18th century, and textile mills in the 19th century. After the Civil War , many immigrants of Irish and French Canadian descent came to work and live there; by

1749-495: The mortgage on his farm and logged the timber of the cedar swamp which today is the millpond. After the logging was complete, they dug the pond with a team of oxen and a scoop. This entire process took two and a half years. George Washington Wells started a small spectacle shop in Southbridge, Massachusetts , in the 1840s which became the American Optical Company . His sons Channing, Albert (called "AB"), and Cheney followed him into

1802-470: The museum's premises the following fall. 42°06′31.88″N 72°05′55.31″W  /  42.1088556°N 72.0986972°W  / 42.1088556; -72.0986972 Southbridge, Massachusetts Southbridge is a city in Worcester County, Massachusetts , United States. The population was 17,740 at the 2020 census . Although Southbridge has a city form of government, it is legally known as

1855-479: The preservation of history through the arts. Recipients have included Norm Abram , Cokie Roberts , John Williams , Tom Brokaw , Sam Waterston , Doris Kearns Goodwin , and Laura Linney . In July 2017, Old Sturbridge Village CEO Jim Donohue, who had previously founded the first charter school in Rhode Island, announced the opening of Old Sturbridge Academy Charter School, which would open in modular classrooms on

1908-416: The series, notably as the children thanking the sponsors at the beginning and end of the show. The show's theme song was written by Steve Horelick, Dennis Neil Kleinman, and Janet Weir; the former also served as the series' music director and composer for all 155 episodes and received an Emmy nomination in 2007 for his work on the series. Over the show's 23-year run, it went through three different versions of

1961-513: The show aired for test audiences in the Nebraska and Buffalo, New York markets (their PBS member stations, the Nebraska ETV [now Nebraska Public Media] and WNED-TV , respectively, were co-producers of the show). The purpose of the show was to encourage a love of books and reading among children. In 2012, an iPad and Kindle Fire educational interactive book reading and video field trip application

2014-510: The show would be shot the same year despite the continuing financial issues of PBS. The show aired its final original episode on November 10, 2006, and continued to air reruns until August 28, 2009. Not only was PBS unable to secure enough funds to cover the costs associated with renewing broadcast rights and continuing reruns, the show's core philosophy was challenged as well. Reading Rainbow prominently featured published books throughout each episode, and licensing those books to be read aloud on

2067-424: The show's cancellation on November 10, 2006, reruns aired until August 28, 2009, when it was removed from the schedule. At the time, it was the third-longest running children's series in PBS history, after Sesame Street and Mister Rogers' Neighborhood . It was the first PBS children's show to be broadcast in stereo. On June 20, 2012, the Reading Rainbow App was released for the iPad and, within 36 hours, became

2120-412: The television series. The original team also included Lynne Brenner Ganek, Ellen Schecter, and host LeVar Burton . The show's title was conceived by an unknown intern at WNED. Each episode centered on a topic from a featured children's book that was explored through a number of on-location segments or stories. The show also recommended books for children to look for when they went to the library. After

2173-563: The theme song. The original theme (used from 1983 to 1999) was performed by Tina Fabrique and featured one of the first uses of the Buchla synthesizer in a TV theme song. The original opening sequence, which consisted of an animated butterfly transforming the surroundings of young children reading books into animated fantasy lands, was used until January 1, 1999. The introductory animation was produced by Ovation Films, Inc. and designed and animated by Bill Davis. Some episodes (from 1983 through 1999) had

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2226-482: The town now has a significant Hispanic and Puerto Rican population. The American Optical Company shut down in 1984, and Southbridge is still struggling from the loss of these and other manufacturing jobs. According to the United States Census Bureau , the city has a total area of 20.9 square miles (54 km ), of which 20.4 square miles (53 km ) is land and 0.5 square miles (1.3 km ), or 2.40%,

2279-405: The waters receded. The damage was estimated to be $ 250,000 in 1955, but Village employees managed to re-open the Village in just nine days. Old Sturbridge Village has more than 40 structures, including restored buildings purchased and relocated from around New England, as well as some authentic reconstructions, and the entire village is divided into three main sections. The Center Village represents

2332-406: The world. Many of its workers were exempted from the draft during World War II since they were doing vital defense work, including making Norden bombsights and even some work on the atomic bomb . By the early 1960s, the mill town had a movie theatre, an AM radio station (WESO), and an airport. New immigrants from Puerto Rico , Laos , and Vietnam began arriving in the 1970s and 1980s, and

2385-501: Was $ 6,478,916. With 105,857 backers, the campaign holds Kickstarter's record for most backers and is the 8th highest amount raised on Kickstarter (as of June 1, 2015). The first product of the Kickstarter campaign was Skybrary by Reading Rainbow . Launched in May 2015, it was a web based subscription service that duplicated the Reading Rainbow app experience. In addition to narrating many of

2438-452: Was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.41 and the average family size was 2.98. In the city, the population was spread out, with 25.4% under the age of 18, 8.6% from 18 to 24, 30.3% from 25 to 44, 20.7% from 45 to 64, and 15.1% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 36 years. For every 100 females, there were 92.8 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 87.2 males. The median income for

2491-413: Was allowed to continue using the Reading Rainbow catchphrase. Visiting the official Reading Rainbow website provided a page that stated "Recent legal disputes between WNED and LeVar Burton/RRKIDZ have been resolved and RRKIDZ no longer licenses the Reading Rainbow brand from WNED. WNED is currently working on the next chapter of Reading Rainbow and will continue its mission of fostering education for

2544-512: Was formed out of portions of three of its neighboring towns: Sturbridge to the west, Charlton to the north, and Dudley to the east. The other neighboring town is Woodstock , Connecticut to the south. As of the census of 2010, there were 16,719 people, 7,077 households, and 4,522 families residing in the city. The population density was 858.9 inhabitants per square mile (331.6/km ). There were 7,511 housing units at an average density of 368.9 per square mile (142.4/km ). The racial makeup of

2597-484: Was founded in 1870. In fiscal year 2008, the town of Southbridge spent 1.03% ($ 426,025) of its budget on its public library—approximately $ 25 per person, per year ($ 32.94 adjusted for inflation to 2022). The Jacob Edwards Library is the public library for the town of Southbridge. It is a member of Central Massachusetts Regional Library System (CMRLS) and C/W MARS . Southbridge has two public elementary schools, formerly "neighborhood schools" serving grades K–5. Since

2650-550: Was graphite which the Winthrops commercialized employing Nipmuck miners. Southbridge was first settled by Europeans in 1730. In 1801 a poll parish, named the Second Religious Society of Charlton, and popularly called Honest Town, was formed from the west part of Dudley , the southwest part of Charlton and the southeast part of Sturbridge . In 1816 this parish was incorporated to become the township of Southbridge. Among

2703-473: Was launched bearing the name of the program. The public television series garnered over 200 broadcast awards, including a Peabody Award and 26 Emmy Awards , 10 of which were in the "Outstanding Children's Series" category. The concept of a reading series for children originated with Twila Liggett, PhD who in partnership with Cecily Truett Lancit and Larry Lancit, at Lancit Media Productions in New York created

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2756-575: Was revoked from RRKidz in October 2017, and all its platforms (including Skybrary) were rebranded to LeVar Burton Kids . An interactive revival titled Reading Rainbow Live debuted on Looped in March 2022. Reading Rainbow was hosted by actor and executive producer LeVar Burton , who was then known for his role in Roots . The show was produced first by Lancit Media Entertainment (1983–2001), and later On-Screen Entertainment (2002–2006). Every episode featured

2809-442: Was used starting on May 8, 2000, with a rerecorded version and the original lyrics performed by R&B artist Chaka Khan . This opening sequence is mostly the same as the second one, but features footage of Burton in place of some of the animated elements. Original production of the series was to have ended after April 4, 2005, with the show continuing to air in reruns , but Burton said on February 7, 2006, that five new episodes of

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