Notes from JWR:

A reminder: Just until January 1, 2014, Ready Made Resources is giving away 15 pre-1965 90% silver dimes for every $100 worth of Mountain House long term storage foods purchased.  So, for example, a $400 food purchase would result in you receiving 60 silver dimes. — Today we present another entry for Round 50 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $9,700+ worth of prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate, good for any one, two, or three course. (A $1,195 value.) B.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be …




Notes from JWR:

Today we present another entry for Round 50 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $9,700+ worth of prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate, good for any one, two, or three course. (A $1,195 value.) B.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be 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, and C.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $350 value.) …




Notes from JWR:

Some very sad news to report: Our Backcountry Editor Mat Stein’s wife Josie passed away on December 22nd. Please keep Mat in your prayers. You can visit Josie’s memorial page and leave your condolences at her Memory Book page. — For those of you pondering a year-end tax deductible donation, please consider one of our favorite charities: Anchor of Hope. (A mission school in rural Zambia.) — Today we present another entry for Round 50 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $9,700+ worth of prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate, good …




Notes from JWR:

Today is celebrated as Christmas, all around the world. December 25th is of course a seasonally convenient time for celebration, just after the Winter Solstice. Most Biblical scholars agree that Christ’s birth probably took place in the spring rather than in December. And his birth year was most likely in 4 BC. To clarify: The original year calculated by Dionysius Exiguus was in error. The Jewish historian Josephus wrote circa 70 AD about the reign of King Herod. He stated that Herod died 37 years after the Romans declared him King, and 34 years from the time he actually became …




Notes from JWR:

It was just reported that Mikhail Kalashnikov died Monday, at age 94. — December 24th is the 14th Anniversary of when John Joe Gray’s legal troubles began. He and his family have been self-sufficiently holed up in their Texas ranch for 13 years, in defiance of a warrant for his arrest. This has been the longest personal standoff in American history, in which he has faced the administrations of four different county sheriffs. — Today we present another entry for Round 50 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $9,400+ worth of prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) …




Notes from JWR:

The ice storm at our Christmas vacation locale is continuing, so I’m again posting SurvivalBlog a day early, just in case. — Today, December 23, 2013, is the 100th anniversary of the exclusive private banking cartel known as The Federal Reserve. Please take a minute to read this piece: A Long-Term Look At Inflation. Clearly, the Federal Reserve has systematically robbed the American people of the value of their currency and savings, via currency inflation. My long-standing advice is to get your money out of Dollars and into tangibles like common caliber ammunition, silver, and productive farm land! I predict …




Notes from JWR:

Because of a local ice storm where we are traveling, I’m posting the blog a full day early, in anticipation of possibly limited Internet access. — December 22nd is the sad anniversary of the death of SP4 James T. Davis, the first uniformed American combat casualty of the Vietnam War, in 1961. This ASA soldier (of the 3rd Radio Research Unit) was killed in a Viet Cong ambush on a road outside Saigon. — Today we present another entry for Round 50 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $9,400+ worth of prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) …




Note from JWR:

Today we present another entry for Round 50 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $9,400+ worth of prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate, good for any one, two, or three course. (A $1,195 value.) B.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be 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, and C.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $350 value.) …




Note from JWR:

Today we present another entry for Round 50 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $9,400+ worth of prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate, good for any one, two, or three course. (A $1,195 value.) B.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be 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, and C.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $350 value.) …




Notes from JWR:

December 19th is the birthday of physicist Albert A. Michelson (Born 1852, died May 9, 1931), the first American to be awarded a Nobel Prize in science, for measuring the speed of light. (Along with Mr. Morley.) FWIW, I’m related to Michelson, by marriage. By way of my great aunt Zelpha (Rawles) Michelson. — Today we present another entry for Round 50 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $9,400+ worth of prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate, good for any one, two, or three course. (A $1,195 value.) B.) A course …




Notes from JWR:

This is the birthday of Charles Wesley (born 1707, died 29 March 1788.) He wrote more that 1,700 hymns. Today is also the birthday of Jørgen Haagen Schmith (born December 18, 1910, died October 15, 1944). He was better known under the codename Citron, was a famous Danish resistance fighter in occupied Denmark. His biographical sketch at Wikipedia describes his death, after he was tracked down by the Nazis: “German soldiers arrived at the house to arrest or kill Schmith. He fought for hours against an overwhelming force of enemy troops killing 11 and wounded scores of other before the …




Notes from JWR:

Today marks the birthday of Simo Häyhä (born 1905, died April 1, 2002.) He was the world’s most successful sniper. Using an iron-sighted Mosin–Nagant in Finland’s Winter War, he had an astounding 505 confirmed sniper kills. — Today we present another entry for Round 50 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $9,400+ worth of prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate, good for any one, two, or three course. (A $1,195 value.) B.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. …




Note from JWR:

Today is the birthday of Philip K. Dick (born 1928, died March 2, 1982.) He penned a remarkable number of sci-fi novels and novellas that have been adapted into movies including Blade Runner, Total Recall, Screamers, Impostor, Minority Report, Paycheck, A Scanner Darkly, Next, and The Adjustment Bureau. Though he had a troubled personal life (with drug use and several failed marriages), his captivating books certainly had a knack for envisioning potential futures.




Notes from JWR:

December 15th is Bill of Rights Day. I encourage my American readers to gather publicly and read the Bill of Rights aloud. This is also the birthday of Uziel “Uzi” Gal (born Gotthard Glas) in Weimar, Germany in 1923. According to his Wikipedia biography, when the Nazis came to power in 1933 his family “…moved first to England and later, in 1936, to Kibbutz Yagur in the British Mandate of Palestine where he changed his name to Uziel Gal. In 1943, he was arrested for illegally carrying a gun and sentenced to six years in prison. However, he was pardoned …




Notes from JWR:

December 14th is the birthday of the late John Warren Wadleigh. (Born 1927, died September 24, 2013.) Wadleigh was better known to many SurvivalBlog readers by his pen name, Oliver Lange. He was the author of the best-selling resistance warfare novel Vandenberg. He reportedly authored 55 novels, but only 13 of them were published. This is also the birthday of Air Force General James H. “Jimmy” Doolittle. (Born 1896, died September 27, 1993.) — Today we present a guest article…