March 20th is the birthday of Mel Tappan. (He was born in 1933, and died in 1980.) His perennially popular survivalist books Survival Guns and Tappan on Survival have a well-deserved following. I designated March 20th as National Survivalism Day, in his honor. This year marks the 40th anniversary of his untimely death. It is also apropos that National Survivalism Day falls in March–one of the months that both Northern Europeans and Native Americans refer to as The Starving Season–when stored food runs low, but before spring bounty appears. SurvivalBlog readers are the type who plan ahead, and stock up. The current virus outbreak is a great “”teachable moment.” I’m sure that Mel Tappan would approve.
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SurvivalBlog Writing Contest
Today we present another entry for Round 87 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round include:
First Prize:
- A gift certificate from Quantum Harvest LLC (up to a $2,200 value) good for 12% off the purchase of any of their sun-tracking models, and 10% off the purchase price of any of their other models.
- A Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate. This can be used for any one, two, or three day course (a $1,095 value),
- A course certificate from onPoint Tactical for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses, excluding those restricted for military or government teams. Three day onPoint courses normally cost $795,
- DRD Tactical is providing a 5.56 NATO QD Billet upper. These have hammer forged, chrome-lined barrels and a hard case, to go with your own AR lower. It will allow any standard AR-type rifle to have a quick change barrel. This can be assembled in less than one minute without the use of any tools. It also provides a compact carry capability in a hard case or in 3-day pack (an $1,100 value),
- Two cases of Mountain House freeze-dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources (a $350 value),
- A $250 gift certificate good for any product from Sunflower Ammo,
- American Gunsmithing Institute (AGI) is providing a $300 certificate good towards any of their DVD training courses.
Second Prize:
- A Front Sight Lifetime Diamond Membership, providing lifetime free training at any Front Sight Nevada course, with no limit on repeating classes. This prize is courtesy of a SurvivalBlog reader who prefers to be anonymous.
- A Glock form factor SIRT laser training pistol and a SIRT AR-15/M4 Laser Training Bolt, courtesy of Next Level Training, which have a combined retail value of $589,
- A $300 purchase credit for any of the products from EMPShield.com
- A Three-Day Deluxe Emergency Kit from Emergency Essentials (a $190 value),
- Two 1,000-foot spools of full mil-spec U.S.-made 750 paracord (in-stock colors only) from www.TOUGHGRID.com (a $240 value).
- An assortment of products along with a one hour consultation on health and wellness from Pruitt’s Tree Resin (a $265 value).
Third Prize:
- Three sets each of made-in-USA regular and wide-mouth reusable canning lids. (This is a total of 300 lids and 600 gaskets.) This prize is courtesy of Harvest Guard (a $270 value)
- A Royal Berkey water filter, courtesy of Directive 21 (a $275 value),
- Naturally Cozy is donating a “Prepper Pack” Menstrual Kit. This kit contains 18 pads and it comes vacuum sealed for long term storage or slips easily into a bugout bag. The value of this kit is $220.
- Two Super Survival Pack seed collections, a $150 value, courtesy of Seed for Security, LLC,
- A transferable $100 purchase credit from Elk Creek Company, toward the purchase of any pre-1899 antique gun. There is no paperwork required for delivery of pre-1899 guns into most states, making them the last bastion of firearms purchasing privacy!
Round 87 ends on March 31st, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and that articles on practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.
Thanks to the Survival Blog team. I am good to go after following the blog now for years. I had always kept extra stuff, as a veteran, you get schooled up. However, one day a few years back, I was listening to Alex Jones and Mr. Rawles was a guest and I distinctly remember, thinking, who is this guest, all this great info. Found out about James Wesley Rawles and Survival Blog. Fast forward, bought all the CDs in the Patriot series. And of course, “How To Survive The End Of The World As We Know It”. Kept adding and tweaking. And along the way slowly the family was coming on board. Then…we have today, Mad Max China Virus(no PC here). The highest compliment I have ever received. My two grandchildren 10 and 11( who are skilled in MMA, firearms, offgrid systems, etc. already), told my daughter they weren’t worried about all that was going on, we have Paw Paw’s company store. That is our name for our storage. There had been a conversation about stores running out of food and such. Plus I have had the zombie perimeter fence for years, so we just lock the gates and chill. And after seeing my prepping now for years, my son just finished with his Army service and bought 15 acres and is going to stay offgrid. This was all started by your blog. It has now become kind of a family thing. My daughter is also on board. And unlike many “hobbies”,that yield no returns, this one can save you and your family. Thanks again Mr. Rawles, I salute your service to your fellow man.
Re: “How to Survive the End of the World As We Know It” – Those that have a copy should turn to Appendix C at the back of the book.
5-MINUTE D.I.Y. ANTI-VIRUS FACE MASK
Posted by Matt Bracken
Mar 20, 2020
https://www.americanpartisan.org/2020/03/5-minute-d-i-y-anti-virus-face-mask/
but not reliable, this masks doesn´t sit Right, seems to be not very secure and i don´t see any Information if the material offers any protection.
New info from medical researchers indicates Covid-19 death rate may be under 1.5% – read the details here: https://www.cnsnews.com/index.php/article/international/patrick-goodenough/new-study-indicates-covid-19-death-risk-may-be-lower
Teachable moment! Yeah, you betcha! I’m good on most items, found some holes that need to be filled. The biggest hole in my preps being I don’t have a retreat yet and I’m stuck in a suburb of Detroit.
This will all blow over, eventually, until the next coronavirus season, starting in November. It’s a bit disturbing that cold, flu, and coronavirus season fall at just about the same time every year. Oh, there is another name for CoVid-19, SARS-CoV-2.
If nothing else, I’ve learned how disruptive a virus can be, even if I believe it’s a false flag event (maybe, maybe not, we’ll see). I’ve also learned how fast the “S” can “HTF” when everyone around you, especially those in charge, is operating in panic mode.
Speaking of the end of CoV season, you’ve got from about the end of April until around the end of October to get prepped for the next round of insanity.
Thank you to all the SB contributors/ moderators. I can’t tell you how helpful the information here has been in helping me see the storm on the horizon. While I am not as prepared as I would like, the information here has helped me to be ahead of the curve. No disaster French toast here! God bless.
Mel Tappen was awesome. His Survival Guns got folks to talking. It didn’t matter if they agreed or not what it did was make people THINK.
They started asking themselves what’s best for me and why did I make these choices?
There of course were some who ran out and bought stuff just cause he said but them folks already and probably still do that ignorant stuff anyway.
I remember great conversations around much of his stuff.