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My July fund-raising campaign to celebrate the fifteenth anniversary since I began Behind the Black is now over. I want to thank all those who so generously donated or subscribed, especially those who have become regular supporters. I can't do this without your help. I also find it increasingly hard to express how much your support means to me. God bless you all!

 

The donations during this year's campaign were sadly less than previous years, but for this I blame myself. I am tired of begging for money, and so I put up the campaign announcement at the start of the month but had no desire to update it weekly to encourage more donations, as I have done in past years. This lack of begging likely contributed to the drop in donations.

 

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Mom arrested for teaching her son independence and self-reliance

Insanity: A mother has been arrested because she let her 7-year-old son walk alone about ten blocks to a neighborhood park.

The boy had a cell phone which he had just used to check in with his mother.

When I was seven I wandered all over my neighborhood in Brooklyn. In fact, when I was 4 to 6 my parents would rent a bungalow in a resort in the Catskills each summer. There, I would wander the countryside every day completely on my own. The resort, called a bungalow colony, was not fancy and did not really have any organized activities for the kids. We were free to explore, and would go miles in all directions into the nearby farm fields and woods. Interestingly, we knew our limits and always stayed within them.

But that was then, when this culture was free and believed in freedom and teaching independence and self-reliance to its young. Now, such ideas are considered evil and must be squelched.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

7 comments

  • Like you Robert, When I was 7, my younger brothers and I were out terrorizing the neighborhood, When I was twelve, I was cooking dinner and babysitting my 4 brothers and 2 sisters, both parents worked, I never had a curfew, but I did know my boundaries as well, at least one of my parents would be jailed for sure in these times.

  • DK Williams

    The country was different when we were little. No way we allowed our three to walk a mile alone at that age. With this said, I don’t agree with this arrest. She should have been let off with a warning.

  • JWing

    When I was 7, with our parents approval, my brother and I would bike to Alley Pond Park in Queens, NYC, It was about two miles from our home where we played and explored. I didn’t realize my parents were committing felony child abuse by allowing us to play in a city park. What else were our bicycles for? Riding aroud the block gets really boring.
    I understand another parent “turned in” the parent after questioning this boy. Welcome, comrade, to Amerika! I HOPE you like it now that it surely has CHANGED.

  • Edward

    When I was 6, my mother thought it was OK for me to walk alone to school through the forest (which looks pretty creepy in wintertime, when there are no leaves on the trees).

    Oh, wait. Hey, guys, do you suppose that our parents were secretly hoping to get rid of us and make it look like an accident? Think about it: how many times did you almost kill yourself by climbing tall trees, riding a bike next to traffic, playing with fireworks, etc.? Geez, how did we ever survive childhood and our parents’ neglect.

    And are we really grown-up enough to take care of ourselves now? Maybe we really *do* need Big Brother to look after us, after all.

    Nah. Big Brother would be just as negligent as our parents were. Maybe even hostile, if we become successful, rich, or famous.

  • I never took my dads suggestion that I go play in the freeway seriously!

  • wodun

    “Oh, wait. Hey, guys, do you suppose that our parents were secretly hoping to get rid of us and make it look like an accident?”

    Now that you bring it up…

  • Robert Clark

    Yes. Those were great days then. A talk show host said his mother when she was young used to walk home alone from work after midnight in New York City.
    Too bad we don’t have those days anymore.

    Bob Clark

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