Off the Wall Survival Thought

[Keith_Indy]

Yeah, this is talking more about after the SHTF and things settle down.

Who's going to know how to build a house, castle, fort, cistern, trebuchet, etc...

 

[El Cazador]

I also just bought my first foxfire book for learning basic skills.

I love those Foxfire books. Always reminds me of my grandparent's farm and livestyle, and of their neighbors down there.

Who's going to know how to build a house, castle, fort, cistern, trebuchet, etc...

Trebuchet? Planning on a siege of the neighbor's castle?

 

[jeremy]

Trebuchet? Planning on a siege of the neighbor's castle?

What you don't have one?

 

[El Cazador]

What you don't have one?

No, I'm still too busy with digging the moat and looking for cold hardy alligators

 

[caneman]

One older series is the "Foxfire" group. Lots of general knowledge for small scale agriculture, log cabins. animal shelter, stills and about anyway you want to go.

Each book was compiled as a group class project for High School seniors and was compiled by talking with their grandparents or great-grandparents etc. As such, they generally detail non electric or gas powered how to do it methods.

 

[Dr Falken]

I've been "archiving" movies for after the collapse, but seriously, look also for older text books, often show how to do things without the current computer technology. Many used book stores have a DIY section, and often these books are fairly cheap. Garage sales too, often have books, a good encyclopedia set is a good thing to have. There was a website, can't remember the name, but it offered a DVD of appropriate technology that contained printable pdf files, so you could have a hard
copy.

We recently bought the "Whole Shebang" from Backwoods Home Journal, and it is chock full of information, both in hardcopy, as well as on CD. I would recommend it to all...it is a little hard to access the info, as there is no index.

Carla Emery's "Cookbook" is another helpful book.

 

[Keith_Indy]

I love those Foxfire books. Always reminds me of my grandparent's farm and livestyle, and of their neighbors down there.



Trebuchet? Planning on a siege of the neighbor's castle?

You can never be to prepared. If you were attacking a fort, and big flaming balls were being dropped into your horde, would you keep attacking??

They also come in handy for pumpkin launching contests...

 

[Libertarian01]

To All,

I agree with the idea of the Foxfire and other survival / "utilitarian" types of books.

My thought is to go "way beyond" that, with books that have good knowledge and ideas that will contribute absolutely (or nearly) nothing to "survival" but will add to an ability to pass on to future generations more advanced lines of thinking. In this way it will not have to be "searched out" or scavanged but rather will it be able to be taught from early on.

Philosophy and political science will not help survive, but they will help in rebuilding. We here all agree in the Bill of Rights, but going beyond that as to what it accomplishes and more importantly "the WHY" these rights are considered universal for all mankind. Often times we pass through our daily lives taking for granted certain absolutes without ever considering that other cultures or times did not even consider them at all.

As an example I have railed against the recent reluctance to honor habeas corpus. Some have placed safety before liberty. I place my liberty before my safety. I hold with Patrick Henry, "Give me liberty or give me death"! I disagree w/ most adminstrations attempts (and some successes) to remove freedoms to secure safety. I say this not to start any sort of argument but rather to show that children and young adults should be exposed to intelligent discourse from both sides of the aisle. If they are never given the opportunity to even think about these values they may go through life programmed with certain beliefs without ever considering alternate views. This idea and/or debate is of no use whatsoever to survival, but it is of tremendous value in shaping a rebuilding society. What do we value? WHY do we value it? Where does political power come from? What SHOULD government do? What do we restrain government from doing?

I also think some of the higher level sciences will be absolutely critical. I just had the opportunity to speak w/ the nephew of a friend. The nephew is studying molecular biology at in Georgia and will be getting his Doctorate in Prosthetics. Some of the advances he spoke of were absolutely amazing! We are learning at an exponential level. We have learned so much at the upper ends of science in the last 10 - 20 years it is amazing! Should anything happen I would hate to think of us as the lost city of Atlantis, idolized but all of our progress wasted and useless.

If books must burn, then burn Harlequin romances...

I just took Accounting 101. It was fascinating to me that accounting is FAR different than what I had generaly thought it to be. I used to think that accountants "did your taxes" and a few other petty things. Now I understand that accountants do a great many things for business and a "few petty tax forms". Accounting will have no value to survival but would have tremendous value to anyone trading beyond simple barter, like a trading post.

In a crisis and post crisis scenario we will all have many pieces to pick up. I want there to be as few pieces as possible so we can get back on our feet as quickly as possible.

Regards,

Doug

PS - Burn sports books too. I don't care about sports in the least.

 

[Keith_Indy]

I've got plenty of pure history books to. Especially the history of our nation, some political books on the history of rights and liberty. Everyone would do good to have a well rounded library. But, not everyone has the time or inclination to sit around reading history, philosophy, business, etc...

 

[henktermaat]

You're thinking of Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven. It's about a cataclysmic asteroid strike. In one part, one of the characters frantically starts preserving every book he can find using mothballs and ziplock bags, focusing especially on the texts he thinks will be needed to rebuild society. Specifically, books on medicine, electronics and electricity, earth sciences, farming, etc.

That was one great story....

 

[Scutter01]

That was one great story....

Hot Fudge Sundae falls on a Tuesday...

 

[caneman]

While always hoping for limited disruptions from any disaster, tools always come to mind for the short or long term. A couple of sources for hand tools are Lehmans.com and Crosscut Saw Company . I carry a bowsaw in each of my vehicles and have used them a couple of times to clear downed trees or large limbs from the roadway. Long term they will outlast chainsaw gasoline. Picked up s drawknife at a garage sale the other day. For you out in the boondocks folks, they don't make as much noise to advertise your location.