This KPBS Midday Edition I am Maureen Cavanaugh. What started out as an event to keep out of school kids occupied before Thanksgiving has turned into a turkey tradition at the library at UC San Diego. The 10th annual Turkey calling show is happening this Wednesday. Host and bandleader Scott Paulson is the man behind the show. He has exhibits and events coordinator at the UC San Diego library. Is also a sound effects waiver -- wizard and a devotee of old-time radio. Thank you for being here. Thank you it is wonderful to be here. What you need to do to call a turkey? Maybe you should invest in some turkey call devices. They come in various shapes and colors. There around little shallow pots that are topped with either slate or copper and he play on them with a stylus like a pen. In fact to hold it just like a pen and you [scratching]. If you do it like this [scratching] it is like a yelp. There are all different kinds of Turkey calls? My favorite one is the sexy sexy per. I can decorate it -- I can demonstrate it with this. It is a box with a stiff -- a stick through and I pump it like this [gobble]. You have to admit that is super sexy. I would not, anything else. What is the more standard turkey call think. Most of these do not do a gobble. This one sure does. It is almost like a teeny tiny accordion and it has one and that is sealed and one that is open and you just shake it. [gobble] and you get the traditional wonderful gobble. Is there a storyline to the Turkey calling show. We performed this show and it is an old tiny radio show with a lively studio audience that knows that they have to participate in the show. The pregame show they get some training on these Turkey calls As you say you like a lot of participation from the audience. A lot of kids are in the audience. Kits can be very shy. How do you overcome that. First of all I make them all read riddles and they do not want to read them. I give them the piece of paper. So this year it is in the form of a greeting card that they can take Tom -- take home and do additional activities. They have the riddle before them. They don't have to read them out loud but here is a little and then it is peer pressure. One kid is always willing to get up and stand in line to read the riddles and the whole line forms and to be really supportive we do it in the laughing Gogo style even though these kids do not know but we play the music and it stops and every the riddle and before anything bad can happen the music begins again. Sometimes people boo and has sat riddles and I do not believe it that. To avoid that we do that interruptive music. It is all supportive. Especially when a wonderful child is reading a little there is no booing allowed. And we are doing it sent -- as if it is a radio show they would think nobody is staring at them. They think they are anonymous and it provides a lot of freedom for them. Do you make these instruments yourself? I have made a couple and they are not here. You can just make them out of a ballpoint pen like for this yelpers style. There is such a thing as a winged bone yelp or you can make it out of two bones from a turkey wing there is always a bigger one and a smaller one and you can dry it and boil it with baking soda and you can take the round and of as little one and put it in the round end of the big one and make a strange little coronet type instrument and [gobble] you do not put it directly in the middle of your mouth he put it off to the side like Popeye and that is a young Turk -- turkey. It's more of a whistle sound for a young turkey because they do not have mature equipment. What about these boxes that you have here. These kind of look like a teeny tiny coffin and on top is a paddle and it is hinged and you slide it off the side. This one has two sites. Can you tell that those are two different hens. It is irresistible to a gobbler. There is no way he can stay away. How did he become aware of all these different sounds that the turkeys make. These items they exhibit very well. And people play on them and it is wonderful. I guess going way back as my French-Canadian grandfather who used to make Turkey calls and he would play them for me and I never went hunting with him but it was so wonderful to be exposed to all of these devices and at this point I think people really should know their food. I'm not saying you should be a vegetarian or let your turkey drink mint juleps around the pulpit you need to know your food you need to know about it and you need to celebrate it and this Turkey calling show is one way to do that. This is the 10th annual Turkey calling show. We had to do research about it we started it off so casually because we were stuck at the library and everyone else is going home early and we saw school kids in the library. When we were kids we did not get the whole week off. A lot of these kids get the entire week off and it such a wonderful opportunity for us to work with some of these children. Yes we are named at -- after Dr. Seuss but we are a serious research library and we have interaction with children so this is fun for us we are stuck in the building the kids are there so we put on a show. He told us that the turkeys receive a pardon at the end of the show. How does that work. There is that. There are no live turkeys in the show. With -- we want to celebrate the whole presidential pardon of the turkey and one of the skits we do in the show is we have several audience members with various kinds of Turkey calls the yelp or and winged bone and the little spray one and I interview them as if they are there for a formal opportunity to ask for a pardon and we take it very seriously and they tell the whole story just for a turkey call. And I translate for the audience. I probably should tell you that at the end of the sketch report and every single turkey. What does it sound like when a turkey is asking for a pardon. It could be that they are really in their background and [gobble] and saying what a large family they have to support and they are still looking for their grandmother [gobble] and they just want to say goodbye to her one my time and they need another full season to do it. It just breaks your heart. It is heartbreaking and it's always nice when they have support from the patriarch saying [gobble] yes I sacrifice myself for this young little hand. Let my turkey go. Exactly. I have been speaking with Scott Paulson he has exhibits and events coordinator at the UC San Diego library and host and bandleader of the Turkey calling show that happens this Wednesday at Kiesel library. Thank you for your turkey calls and thank you. You are very welcome. [gobble] see you on Thanksgiving. You can see all the Turkey calling instruments on our website. Be sure to join us again tomorrow for KPBS Midday Edition at noon . I am Maureen Cavanaugh thank you for listening.
Gobble, gobble. The 10th annual Turkey Calling Show is an old-fashioned radio drama that includes audience participation and a turkey pardon. The family event is happening Wednesday at noon in the Seuss Room at UC San Diego's Geisel Library.
Scott Paulson, the show's creator and host said its a chance for kids to be loud in an area often reserved for silence.
"There's a long tradition of using turkey calls for hunting purposes but we're using it as an opportunity to be noisy in the library," Paulson said. "It's just one of those unusual Seussean things we try to do here."
Paulson, who also hosts a twice monthly radio drama on WsRadio.com, joins KPBS Midday Edition Monday to make some noise.
