Category: Survival Mindset

Pre-Crisis Survival Skills, by D.A.L.

Pre-crisis survival skills: The only tool more valuable than knowledge is an attitude of self sufficiency. The mere willingness to provide for your own needs can pay off everyday, even absent any “end of the world as we know it” event. In fact, simply being willing to provide for your own needs can pave the way for not only learning valuable skills, but saving money to boot! By way of example let me tell you about a recent experience with the steam heating system at my lady friend’s house. It is a Victorian house and the main boiler furnace was …


City Versus Country Mindsets and Expectations, by Inyokern

As we all know, City people and Country people have a very different outlook on life. Some of that is opportunity, some is envy, some is ignorance. For the last 120+ years, the US economy (and much of the world economy) has been one of capitalism and materialism. Making stuff and selling it, making the economy grow until the physical limits are reached. Well, they’ve been reached. Peak Oil has led to the beginning of what is probably a pretty long collapse, but I can only judge based on the Roman Empire and the 1929 crash, history, rather than compare …


Letter Re: First Hand Observations on the Recent Pacific Northwest Wind Storm

Background: I am an 11 year veteran peace officer and survivalist, or in more politically correct terminology, a POP – Preparedness Oriented Person. I work in a moderate sized city in the Seattle area. On 14-15 December, the Tacoma-Seattle-Everett metropolitan area suffered one of the most deadly and damaging windstorms in recorded history. The storm easily eclipsed the last major deadly blow on Inaugural Day, 1993. That storm had been identified as a “once in a century” type storm. At the peak, over 1 million people did not have power. This storm was modeled and forecasted with accuracy five days …


Letter Re: Robert A. Heinlein Didn’t Just Talk and Write About Preparedness

Dear Jim, I’m not sure if you have covered Robert A. Heinlein’s shelter that featured in his novel, “Farnham’s Freehold.” This site describes the house that Heinlein built in Colorado Springs before NORAD moved into the area And here’s an archived link of the shelter underneath, which included both air bottles and ventilation, escape routes, and antenna mounts.- Michael Z. Williamson


Letter Re: Property Owning “Refugees” on Adjoining Property

Mr. Rawles, Thank you for putting so much effort into your blog and your writings. I bought your novel “Patriots” a few years back, dog eared it, and passed it around. To my wife’s consternation (and my to the consternation of my brothers’ wives), you’ve started to make a difference in how we look at life. Your blog is a daily “must read.” Since I live 200 miles from my brothers in Iowa (my most likely doubling-up partners) I have to consider a retreat farther north in Wisconsin. There are large tracts of federal, state, and county forest, plus the …


Letter Re: Some Good Things Prompted By SurvivalBlog

Jim, The following are some things SurvivalBlog.com has prompted me to do since I began reading it: I’ve had no debt for 20 years, but my meager holdings are now about 1/3 precious metals. Is lead considered a precious metal? 🙂 My freezer is full of elk, whitetail deer, and caribou. I added to my long-term foods during your Safecastle special, but I’m now reviewing the viability of my existing stocks. Like the realtor’s mantra of “location, location, location”, a survivalist’s creed should be “Rotate, rotate, rotate. “ A 10 KW Generac generator is ready to be wired to my …


Letter Re: Advice on Cash and Weapons While Traveling Overseas

Mr Rawles: My first family vacation is coming up and we’ll be in New Zealand for three weeks. I’ll be away from my food, guns, ammunition, and assorted survival stash. Add to that that I can’t take more than $10,000 in cash out of the country and can’t take any weapons with me. So, what do you take with you on such a trip? Gold is too heavy. Any ideas on what to bring that won’t weigh me down. Thanks, – S. JWR Replies: Assuming that your main purposes in carrying cash and/or specie would be 1.) to secure passage …


Letter Re: Prowlers and Lighting

Jim: What do you and your readers suggest for someone living in a rural area who needs a good strong light for prowlers? I live on top of a mountain in a cove surrounded by three sides by hills. On occasion, we have trespassers at night riding the ATV trails along the hills who are out to steal tools, gas, etc. There have been more than a few occasions when I’ve walked out to my car late at night to get something and realized there were people in the trees. One night I turned my rather anemic Surefire 6P [flashlight] …


Letter Re: Some Useful British Survival Web Sites

Mr Rawles, Here are a few British sites that may be of interest I found while looking at a fan site for an old TV series called Survivors which was written by Terry Nation, who also created Dr. Who for the BBC. The BBC Survivors series was made back in the 1970’s and while the technology and BBC aversion to realistic weaponcraft might make many of you readers weep (myself included) the themes and storylines of a group of middle class English people who survive a plague that kills all but 1 in 10,000 people are timeless. Along with Andre …


Letter Re: Enlightened Survivalism Article in The Energy Bulletin

Jim, The comments in today’s SurvivalBlog concerning my ‘Enlightened Survivalism’ article that was posted on the Energy Bulletin that ‘this more likely qualifies as preaching to the choir’ is exactly why the article was not sent to yourself for posting on SurvivalBlog. I tried ‘preaching to the choir’ as you put it with my post to you ‘Considerations for Longer Term Survival’ that you posted on Wednesday, December 21, 2005. It would seem that many have still not really got to grips with its contents particularly: ‘What about food when the “Year’s Food Supply” is gone? What about your water …


Another Perspective on Selecting Barter Goods, by OSOM

Dear Jim: The recent letter on barter goods caused me to sit down and organize my thoughts on the matter. Running a successful retail/wholesale operation, I can see some caveats and analysis that needs further exploration. What’s WRONG with Barter Goods As has been well emphasized before – forget about barter goods until you are squared away for your own logistics. Beyond that, remember that barter goods are much inferior to money or cash in a functioning economy, with a good division of labor. If you need to sell them to raise cash, it will take some effort, and you …


The Forgotten Survival Skill: Physical Fitness, by Ron D.

Most of the people of the world and especially Americans are urban dwellers. We commute to an office every day and sit at a desk. Just as the skills needed to do this don’t prepare us for a shortage of water or food, they don’t prepare us to evacuate on foot or run from danger. But unlike other parts of preparedness, they actually work against us in a future survival situation. When I was a freshman in college I was returning to school in Oklahoma with a friend. About three miles outside a little town in the middle of no …


Letter Re: An Early Snowstorm in Western New York

Well, mother nature really gave it to them this week. There were 24 inches of snow dumped on us in about 24 hours. That, and the trees still had most of their leaves still intact. That just made more surface for the snow to stick, and it was the wettest imaginable snow you have ever seen. I’m writing this on Sunday. The power has been out since about 5 P.M. on Friday, and they are saying it won’t all be back on till next weekend. I didn’t lose my power, since I live north of the worst of it. I …


The NGO Security Blog

The NGO Security blog has a few manuals that may be of interest to SurvivalBlog readers. The ICRC Staying Alive Manual has a good explanation for your readers who do not have military training on the effects of military weapons and how to protect yourself from them. Plus it is interesting to read the incidents happening in the rest of the world. That is how society will be should TEOTWAWKI happen in the developed world. Incidentally, I was the dot on your global SurvivalBlog hit map that you saw in Khartoum a few months back. I work for an International …


Letter Re: American Citizenry Preparedness — Columbia University Study

Jim- I sent a preparedness study [from Columbia University] to your attention a few weeks ago; I could not find the online source document. Since it showed up in my media scanning again today, I tried to track it down a little better. I have below some associated links, and the home page (which has a great deal of additional info on it: Preparedness Study News Article Columbia University Projects Web Page Columbia University Research Page Columbia University Index Page As a side note, I purchased Arbogast’s “Rawles Gets You Ready” preparedness course.; it has much well thought out content. …