To read this post please scroll down.

 

Readers!

 

It is now July, time once again to celebrate the start of this webpage in 2010 with my annual July fund-raising campaign.

 

This year I celebrate the fifteenth anniversary since I began Behind the Black. During that time I have done more than 33,000 posts, mostly covering the global space industry and the related planetary and astronomical science that comes from it. Along the way I have also felt compelled as a free American citizen to regularly post my thoughts on the politics and culture of the time, partly because I think it is important for free Americans to do so, and partly because those politics and that culture have a direct impact on the future of our civilization and its on-going efforts to explore and eventually colonize the solar system.

 

You can’t understand one without understanding the other.

 

Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent independent analysis you don’t find elsewhere. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn’t influenced by donations by established companies or political movements. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.

 

You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four 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.
 

3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:

 

4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed 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.


Mother, Father, Sister, Brother – The Sound of Philadelphia

An evening pause: This instrumental music, used as the theme music for the 1970s television show, Soul Train, has only one significant vocal line: “People all over the world!” I think the visuals used here, of Earth taken from the International Space Station, make that line seem especially appropriate.

Hat tip James Stephens.

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. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. 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

  • Cotour

    The coming dark age: (there are people that seriously have this discussion, it has been presented to me as such)

    https://youtu.be/mtZpyj4vpnM

    This video must disturb their theory :)

  • Ted

    Enjoyed this clip a lot! One of the most interesting parts is the movement of the solar arrays on ISS. Most of the pictures of the ISS on line are static shots. But ISS is a working machine hundreds of miles up in space. It runs 24 hours a day 365 days a year. Also the lightning flashes very interesting. What a cool place we live in (on, under above)!

  • Edward

    Ted,
    I, too, enjoy the lightning. I once worked in a lab in which a couple of the scientists were studying lightning. Among their data were some videos from space of storms. One of the scientists mentioned that the estimate was that, worldwide, there were a hundred lightning flashes each second (this would be around 3 billion each year). My own thought at the time, judging from the field of view and he flash-rate of the video, was that the estimate may be an order of magnitude too high, that there might be more like 10 flashes per second (around 300 million per year). Either way, a billion flashes per year seems to me to be a reasonable rough order of magnitude estimate.

    The music goes nicely with this video. Although it presents largely the dark side, images of Earth from space are very beautiful. The atmosphere is a pretty sight, as are the city lights, clouds, and coast lines. I especially like the auroras, and the flashing lightning attracts the eye, of course.

    No wonder astronauts like to look out the window.

Readers: the rules for commenting!

 

No registration is required. I welcome all opinions, even those that strongly criticize my commentary.

 

However, name-calling and obscenities will not be tolerated. First time offenders who are new to the site will be warned. Second time offenders or first time offenders who have been here awhile will be suspended for a week. After that, I will ban you. Period.

 

Note also that first time commenters as well as any comment with more than one link will be placed in moderation for my approval. Be patient, I will get to it.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *