Born on this day – Richard Eberhart:

Richard Eberhart

Writer

April 5, 1904 – June 9, 2005

Credits:

Books:

A Bravery of Earth (1930); Brotherhood of Men (1949); Burr Oaks (1947); Collected Poems, 1930–1976 (1976); Collected Verse Plays (1962); Fields of Grace (1972); Great Praises (1957); New and Selected Poems: 1930–1990 (1990); Poems (1945); Reading the Spirit (1937); Selected Poems, 1930–1965 (1965); Shifts of Being (1968); Song and Idea (1942); The Long Reach: New and Uncollected Works 1948–1984 (1984); The Quarry: New Poems (1964); Thirty One Sonnets (1967); Undercliff: Poems 1946–1953 (1953); War and the Poet (1945).

Born on this day – Spencer Tracy:

Spencer Tracy

Actor

April 5, 1900 – June 10, 1967

Born on this day – Walter Huston:

Walter Huston

Actor

Singer

April 5, 1883 – April 7, 1950

Credits:

100 Years at the Movies (1994); A House Divided (1931); Abraham Lincoln (1930); AFI Life Achievement Award (1974); Always in My Heart (1942); America at the Movies (1976); American Experience (2011); American Madness (1932); American Masters (1993–2009); America's Woman (2024); An Intimate Dinner in Celebration of Warner Bros. Silver Jubilee (1930); And Then There Were None (1945); Ann Vickers (1933); Anniversary (1963); Barbara Stanwyck: Fire and Desire (1991); Bragging Rites: The Carolina-Clemson Rivalry (2003); Brasileiros em Hollywood (1970); Brother Can You Spare a Dime (1975); Call to Duty (1946); Century of Cinema (1995); Checking Out: Grand Hotel (2004); Combat Report (1942); December 7th (1943); Discovering Huston (2012); Discovering Treasure: The Story of the Treasure of the Sierra Madre (2003); Dodsworth (1936); Dragon Seed (1944); Dragonwyck (1946); Duel in the Sun (1946); EastEnders (2004); Edge of Darkness (1943); Filmed Prologue to Birth of a Nation (1930); Five Came Back (2017); For God and Country (1943); Gabriel Over the White House (1933); Gentlemen of the Press (1929); Going Hollywood: The '30s (1984); Hell Below (1933); History Rediscovered: Report from the Aleutians (2013); Hollywood and the Stars (1963–1964); Hollywood Hobbies (1935); Hollywood on Parade No. A-6 (1933); Hollywood on Parade No. A-9 (1933); Hollywood on Parade No. B-5 (1933); Hollywood Out-takes and Rare Footage (1983); Hollywood Without Make-Up (1963); Hollywood: The Great Stars (1963); How I Play Golf, by Bobby Jones No. 7: 'the Spoon' (1931); Independent Lens (2017); Intimate Interviews: Walter Huston (1931); James Cagney: That Yankee Doodle Dandy (1981); Joan Crawford: Always the Star (1996); John Ford Goes to War (2002); John Huston, une âme libre (2021); John Huston: The Man, the Movies, the Maverick (1988); Keep 'Em Rolling (1934); Know Your Ally: Britain (1944); Know Your Enemy - Japan (1945); Kongo (1932); Land of Liberty (1939); Law and Order (1932); Let There Be Light (1980); Martinez, Margaritas and Murder! (2025); Momo: The Sam Giancana Story (2011); Night Court (1932); Notes to Anarchism (2006); Of Human Hearts (1938); Rain (1932); Report from the Aleutians (1943); Rhodes (1936); Safeguarding Military Information (1942); Screen Snapshots, Series 30, No. 7: Hollywood Memories (1951); September Affair (1950); Storm at Daybreak (1933); Summer Holiday (1948); Sunkist Stars at Palm Springs (1936); Swamp Water (1941); That's Entertainment! (1974); That's Entertainment, Part II (1976); The 21st Annual Academy Awards (1949); The Bad Man (1930); The Battle of Britain (1943); The Battle of China (1944); The Beast of the City (1932); The Birth of a Nation (1915); The Bishop's Candlesticks (1929); The Carnival Man (1929); The Criminal Code (1931); The Devil and Daniel Webster (1941); The Dick Cavett Show (1971); The Ed Sullivan Show (1956); The Furies (1950); The Great Sinner (1949); The Lady Lies (1929); The Light That Failed (1939); The Maltese Falcon (1941); The Milton Berle Show (1949); The Nazis Strike (1943); The North Star (1943); The Outlaw (1943); The Prizefighter and the Lady (1933); The Ruling Voice (1931); The Shanghai Gesture (1941); The Star Witness (1931); The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948); The Virginian (1929); The Virtuous Sin (1930); The Wet Parade (1932); The Woman from Monte Carlo (1932); This Our Life (1942); Thou Shalt Not: Sex, Sin and Censorship in Pre-Code Hollywood (2008); Transatlantic Tunnel (1935); Trenches (2022); Twenty Years After (1944); Two Americans (1929); War Comes to America (1945); War Department Report (1943); Warner at War (2008); Why We Fight (1942); Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942).

Born on this day – Winchell Smith:

Winchell Smith

Writer

April 5, 1871 – June 10, 1933

Credits:

Three on a Spree (1961); Broadway Television Theatre (1952); Kraft Theatre (1949–1951); The Hurricane at Pilgrim Hill (1950); Brewster's Millions (1945); Brewster's Millions (1935); Lightnin' (1930); The Love Doctor (1929); The Fortune Hunter (1927); Going Crooked (1926); Miss Brewster's Millions (1926); Thank You (1925); The Wheel (1925); Lightnin' (1925); The Boomerang (1925); The Bandolero (1924); The Saphead (1920); The Lambs' All-Star Gambol (1914).

Recommended reading - The Blue Hammer, by Ross Macdonald (1976):

The Blue Hammer

By Ross Macdonald.

Published by Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group.

First published 1976.

ISBN-10: 0307279065

ISBN-13: 978-0307279064

Description:

The desert air is hot with sex and betrayal, death and madness and only Detective Lew Archer can make sense of a killer who makes murder a work of art.

Finding a purloined portrait of a leggy blonde was supposed to be an easy paycheck for Archer, but that was before the bodies began piling up. Suddenly, Archer find himself smack in the middle of a decades-long mystery of a brilliant artist who walked into the desert and simply disappeared. He left behind a bevy of muses, molls, dolls, and dames-each one scrambling for what they thought was rightfully theirs.

Anne Lamott, on writing and reading:

Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation.

It's like singing on a boat during a terrible storm at sea.

You can't stop the raging storm,

but singing can change the hearts and spirits of the people who are together on that ship.

- Anne Lamott.

On this day in the Star Trek universe:

The Star Trek Reader IV / book (1978)

Star Trek: Discovery (2019 & 2024)

The Star Trek Reader IV

By James Blish.

Published by E P Dutton.

Published 1978.

First Edition.

Hardcover.

ISBN-10: 052520962X

ISBN-13: 978-0525209621

Description:

James Blish was a science fiction writer who wrote over 27 novels, most notably the Cities in Flight series, and A Case of Conscience, for which he won a Hugo Award. He also was a highly respected critic, and his criticism in collected in the books The Issue at Hand, and More Issues at Hand, (published under the pen name of William Atheling, Jr.). Using the original scripts, which sometimes differed from the final filmed episode, Blish turned each episode of the original Star Trek into a short story, which were collected into anthologies and published as paperback originals. The Star Trek Reader IV collects two of these anthologies: Star Trek 10, and Star Trek 11, and Blish's original Star Trek novel, Spock Must Die!. The episodes present include: The Alternative Factor; The Empath; The Galileo Seven; Is There in Truth No Beauty?; A Private Little War; The Omega Glory; What Are Little Girles Made Of?; The Squire of Gothos; Wink of an Eye; Bread and Circuses; Day of the Dove; and Plato's Stepchildren.

Star Trek: Discovery

Season 2. Episode 12.

Episode entitled: Through the Valley of Shadows.

Released April 4, 2019.

Directed by Doug Aarniokoski.

Created by Bryan Fuller, Alex Kurtzman.

Written by Bo Yeon Kim, Erika Lippoldt, Kirsten Beyer, Sean Cochran.

Based on Star Trek, created by Gene Roddenberry.

Music by Jeff Russo.

Cast: Sonequa Martin-Green, Doug Jones, Anthony Rapp, Mary Wiseman, Wilson Cruz, Shazad Latif, Anson Mount, Mia Kirshner, Mary Chieffo, Ethan Peck, Tig Notaro, Kenneth Mitchell, Rachael Ancheril, Emily Coutts, Patrick Kwok-Choon, Oyin Oladejo, Ronnie Rowe, Sara Mitich, Ali Momen, Julianne Grossman, Ian James Corlett, David Benjamin Tomlinson, Byron Abalos, Olivia Croft, Nicole Dickinson, Pamela Mars, Shelley Owens, Ronald Tang.

Star Trek: Discovery

Season 5. Episode 1.

Episode entitled: Red Directive.

Released April 4, 2024.

Directed by Olatunde Osunsanmi.

Created by Bryan Fuller, Alex Kurtzman.

Written by Michelle Paradise, Brandon Schultz, Lauren Wilkinson, Carlos Cisco, Eric J. Robbins.

Based on Star Trek, created by Gene Roddenberry.

Music by Jeff Russo.

Cast: Sonequa Martin-Green, Doug Jones, Anthony Rapp, Mary Wiseman, Wilson Cruz, Blu del Barrio, Callum Keith Rennie, David Ajala, Oded Fehr, David Cronenberg, Annabelle Wallis, Tara Rosling, Eve Harlow, Elias Toufexis, Emily Coutts, Patrick Kwok-Choon, Oyin Oladejo, Orville Cummings, David Benjamin Tomlinson, Victoria Sawal, Natalie Liconti, J. Adam Brown, Gregory Ambrose Calderone, Mei Chung, Michael Copeman, Julianne Grossman, Addison Holley, Nicole Nwokolo, Flex Aleo.

Star Trek: Discovery

Season 5. Episode 2.

Episode entitled: Under the Twin Moons.

Released April 4, 2024.

Directed by Doug Aarniokoski.

Created by Bryan Fuller, Alex Kurtzman.

Written by Alan B. McElroy, Brandon Schultz, Lauren Wilkinson, Carlos Cisco, Eric J. Robbins.

Based on Star Trek, created by Gene Roddenberry.

Music by Jeff Russo.

Cast: Sonequa Martin-Green, Doug Jones, Anthony Rapp, Mary Wiseman, Wilson Cruz, Blu del Barrio, Callum Keith Rennie, David Ajala, Oded Fehr, Chelah Horsdal, Annabelle Wallis, Eve Harlow, Elias Toufexis.