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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.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation. Takes about a 10% cut.
 

3. A Paypal Donation or subscription, which takes about a 15% cut:

 

4. Donate by check. I get whatever you donate. Make the check payable to Robert Zimmerman and mail it to
 
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652

 

You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.


2018 Hot Rod Wild Rides

An evening pause: A breath-taking collection of crashes and failures during the 2018 National Hot Rod Association race season One could call this a collection of engineering failures, but I don’t see it that way. For one, absolutely no one was seriously hurt, proving the design of their safety features. For another, the engine failures show how they are pushing the engineering to the max to win.

Hat tip Cotour.

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

3 comments

  • Alex Andrite

    Be still my heart !
    Yep, I followed the rails and flat tracks in my youth.
    Ear plugs and ear muffs !
    The screaming roars of power, and often smashing screams of destruction, were really something.
    The “aroma” of the high tech fuel, mixed with burned melted and molten rubber was amazing !!!
    Sort of a fire and brimstone thing.
    Thanks for the memories Cotur !
    Yep, very cool.

  • Cotour

    This was my original comment related to the video:

    “If there are indeed aliens clandestinely watching the human race, observing us to better understand what makes us who and what we are, this and things like it are certainly the reasons that they keep on watching and scratching their bulbous heads.”

    Humans, like no other?

    Or if there are other similar “intelligent” life forms in the universe, did they also go through similar kinds of behaiviors and activities such as this? Dangerous and life threatening beyond reason? I would have to assume that that would be so.

  • Col Beausabre

    “HAHAHA, RAAAAACEWAY PARK”

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kqm67gqOIk

    The radio jungle for the home of the Summer Nationals in my teens, Englishtown, New Jersey. Nitro Fuel Dragsters! Funny Cars!! Art Arfons “Green Monster” jet powered dragster!!! Run what you brung!!! GIRLS!!!! I spent many summer Friday evenings there with my buddies watching the cars and trying to pick up girls. But what I really loved was the SCCA’s Trans-Am series with the classic Pony Cars.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVCvHJnxJ20

    And Bob is right, the motor sports sanctioning bodies have developed a set of set of stringent rules concerning car construction and driver apparel and restraints to ensure driver survival if things get pear shaped. (you’re actually safer on the track than the highway, all the other drivers hold competition licenses, rather than a random collection of Lord knows who)

    And yeah, seeing those Funny Cars demolish themselves when they blow the heads off the block is pretty wild!

    Proud member of Northern NJ Region, Sports Car Club of America (raced in regional Class H Production back in the day)

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