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Readers! A November fund-raising drive!

 

It is unfortunately time for another November fund-raising campaign to support my work here at Behind the Black. I really dislike doing these, but 2025 is so far turning out to be a very poor year for donations and subscriptions, the worst since 2020. I very much need your support for this webpage to survive.

 

And I think I provide real value. Fifteen years ago I said SLS was garbage and should be cancelled. Almost a decade ago I said Orion was a lie and a bad idea. As early as 1998, long before almost anyone else, I predicted in my first book, Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, that private enterprise and freedom would conquer the solar system, not government. Very early in the COVID panic and continuing throughout I noted that every policy put forth by the government (masks, social distancing, lockdowns, jab mandates) was wrong, misguided, and did more harm than good. In planetary science, while everyone else in the media still thinks Mars has no water, I have been reporting the real results from the orbiters now for more than five years, that Mars is in fact a planet largely covered with ice.

 

I could continue with numerous other examples. If you want to know what others will discover a decade hence, read what I write here at Behind the Black. And if you read my most recent book, Conscious Choice, you will find out what is going to happen in space in the next century.

 

 

This last claim might sound like hubris on my part, but I base it on my overall track record.

 

So please consider donating or subscribing to Behind the Black, either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. I could really use the support at this time. There are five ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

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Six Turnin and Four Burnin

An evening pause: From the 1955 Jimmy Stewart film Strategic Air Command. The B-36, with both propeller and jet engines, was soon superseded, but the takeoff, as captured so well in the movie, is impressive. It was a big plane.

Hat tip again to Phil Berardelli, author of Phil’s Favorite 500: Loves of a Moviegoing Lifetime.

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

  • Dale Martin

    As an Air Force brat in Ft Worth, I watched some of the filming of this fine film. The B-36 Bombers flew over our house on Garza St, all the time, and one gets used to the noise. My Father was a Flight Engineer on these aircraft, so once, on a Sunday my Dad took me and my Brother to the Plant, to get a tour. It was most interesting, and later that day, we got to try our skill with tail gunner simulator, which is most likely the first video game ever produced!! I got two Migs!

  • Phil Berardelli

    Nice post, Dale! Thanks for sharing.

  • PeterF

    They had a B36 on display at Chanute AFB as well as a number of other rare aircraft. The B36 dwarfed the B52s.

  • Dale Martin

    Phil: The filming was a big deal, they held up traffic at the East Gate for some shots of the Gate Scene, they would let the traffic pass and try again. I think they finally did it on a Sunday. As kids we got to climb thru and sit in the crew positions of the new B-36 Bombers parked at Convair, keep in mind, in those days, Military Brats did mind their elders!! My Dad was assigned to the Convair side, doing the acceptance flights, not the active SAC side at Carswell. I did see the B-25 that was used to do the aerial filming parked on the Air Force side once or twice, I think that Paul Mantz or someone like him used the surplus bomber for the shots. It was the first and last time I saw a B-45 Tornado in the flesh, parked out on the ramp with the civilian B-25. I think this is visible in the film during the DC-3 landing scene with the Armored Car and the Air Police. One of my favorite films, ever!!

  • Phil Berardelli

    Great stuff, Dale! Thanks for this as well.

  • bkivey

    “The B36 dwarfed the B52s.”

    That’s saying something!

  • bkivey

    A manly movie featuring a manly aircraft. My favorite scene is when Stewart’s character expresses concern about getting home on time, and his CO promises just one takeoff and landing. Of course, it’s a bomber mission. . . Fighters make headlines; bombers make history.

    I’m not an Air Force brat (Army), but when we had a job in Honolulu directly adjacent to the airport, our intern would stop and watch every time a C-5 went by. I understood the attraction. That’s a lot of metal.

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