Ever since Reading Rainbow went off the air in 2006, LeVar Burton has been working to bring it back. In 2012, he launched a tablet app program, and just recently, he launched a Kickstarter campaign asking for $1 million to develop Reading Rainbow programming across all platforms, which will be provided to classrooms for free.
The Reading Rainbow Kickstarter campaign now has nearly $5 million in funding and has become the most backed Kickstarter campaign ever, with more than 91,000 backers.
Burton tweeted out the news this morning and Kickstarter confirmed.
Hey Y’all… @readingrainbow just became the most backed @kickstarter ever!!!! #THANK #YOU http://t.co/k9ere80B9g
— LeVar Burton (@levarburton) June 30, 2014
The most financially successful Kickstarter campaign still goes to the Pebble, which received more than $10 million in funding but had only around 60,000 backers.
The Reading Rainbow Kickstarter campaign was successful right from the get-go. The project reached its $1 million goal in just one day, and LeVar Burton’s emotional reaction was luckily caught on tape. You can check that out here.