Levar Burton – actor, producer, writer (founder and producer of Reading Rainbow, actor on Star Trek, actor in mini-series Roots). In 1983 he became host and executive producer of PBS' Reading Rainbow, a show aimed at teaching young children to read. The series won five Emmys and a Peabody Award (1993), among various other honors, over its more than 20 years on the air (1983-2009). In 2011, Burton announced the launch of RRKidz, a reading and exploration platform/company aimed at motivating kids to "experience literature via the digital devices they love," offering hundreds of books through a subscription service. "Reading will never go out of style, but the tools used for learning are changing," Burton said in a statement released at the time. "I am excited to bring Reading Rainbow back so that parents who watched the show can now share that same feel-­good experience with their own children, but on platform that resonates with today's digital kids."