Volunteer spreads news to the blind

The voice comes through the radio speaker clear and cool as Irish crystal, captivating a small but devoted audience from Tremonton to Toquerville.

"Now, on to the comics," says Larry Goldsmith from a closet-sized, soundproof booth in the Utah State Library for the Blind. He flips through the Deseret News to his favorite comic strip, Drabble.

"I can't believe this, honey bunch — you bought low-fat ice cream, low-fat potato chips and low-fat peanut butter," says Goldsmith, reading what Drabble is saying to his wife. "What's next?" He pauses before Mrs. Drabble's punch line: "How about a low-fat husband?"

Goldsmith then reads Sally Forth, Spiderman and more than a dozen other funnies before moving on to Dear Abby and the latest musical reviews. It takes him more than an hour to work his way through the entire newspaper, but he's not a man in a hurry.

Since he retired in 2002, Goldsmith has had plenty of time to pursue his passion of volunteering, from tutoring Latino kids at the Guadalupe Center to working as an advocate for the Alliance House, a social and vocational support network for the mentally ill.

Every Tuesday, you'll find him in front of a microphone at the Utah State Library for the Blind, reading the latest political headlines and crime stories aloud, so the visually impaired can keep up with the news.

Besides providing a way for blind Utahns to hear daily obituaries, grocery sales and celebrity scandals, Goldsmith's weekly report allows him to carry on a secret fantasy.

"All my adult life," he says, "people have said to me, 'You have a nice voice; you should go into radio.' I don't hear it, but that's what I'm told. So when I retired, I thought, 'Why not? I can read. I'll use my voice on the radio to help somebody who can't see.' "

Goldsmith, 78, is among about 30 volunteers who take turns recording daily newspaper reports or reciting books to be broadcast through closed-circuit radio to the visually impaired.

Hoping to convince more people with unfilled broadcasting dreams to devote an hour or two to reading the latest headlines or mystery novels in a soundproof booth, Goldsmith met me for a Free Lunch chat after one of his recording sessions.

"This place is the best-kept secret in Utah," he says, motioning to the tall racks of Braille books outside the studio. "How many people know that this is the largest library for the blind in the world?"

While people from 21 states order Braille books through the Utah library, Goldsmith's radio audience is limited to a few thousand, and that's just fine with him.

"I think I've had one person tell me they heard me on the radio," he says, grinning. "So I know that I have at least one fan."