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The whole of the Whole Earth Catalog is now online

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Re: The whole of the Whole Earth Catalog is now online

#31

Post by duskwuff »

cc101 wrote: post #28
8bitsrule wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They paved paradise and put in a parking lot. WEC: Eye-opener. Lot of fun to order exotic stuff (tools, foods, materials, clothing) from. A few for-examples: it got me to cane a seat on a (once-expensive) thrift-shop store ... and try some east-coast kinnikinic ... order tea from Canada (Merchies, still there) ... and a lot of previously unseen books (including Lloyd Kahn's). The cool comments (and stories) around th…

Talking about paving paradise, Kepler's is now a huge multi-story store. Several decades ago I looked in vain for even a little table or shelf with leading-edge counter-culture literature. Couldn't find anything resembling that.

> Talking about paving paradise, Kepler's is now a huge multi-story store.

Unless there's another book store called Kepler's I'm not familiar with, it isn't. The building is multiple stories, but Kepler's is only on the first floor (and even there, it isn't the only tenant). The upper stories are unrelated office space.

Re: The whole of the Whole Earth Catalog is now online

#34

Post by jh00ker »

bane wrote: post #10

I never grew up knowing the Whole Earth Catalog, but in the early '80s I was a precocious elementary school student who practically lived in any library I could get access to. My school library happened to have a copy of a particularly magical book that was loosely patterned after the WEC, the "Kids' Whole Future Catalog". https://paleofuture.com/blog/2007/4/27/the-kids-whole-future... I obsessively checked it out of…

I have a similar story about a set of books from the 80s that weren't as much as inspiration for me and the future, but instead became a major source of forming my own broad general knowledge on core topics: Charlie Brown's 'Cyclopedia.

Every week, at the local grocery store, a new volume would be available for purchase, covering a new subject area (Anatomy, Animals, Aircraft, Watercraft, Electricity, Space, Weather, etc.). I was obsessed. I re-read all 15 of them countless times.

30+ years later, I bought a set off ebay in great shape to read with my kids. Seeing the diagrams and pictures I realized it was the source of many of the facts I know today.

You never know what's going to have an impact on your kids helping them realize what they are (going to be) interested in!

Re: The whole of the Whole Earth Catalog is now online

#36

Post by spanktheuser »

vertis wrote: post #18
bane wrote: post #10

I never grew up knowing the Whole Earth Catalog, but in the early '80s I was a precocious elementary school student who practically lived in any library I could get access to. My school library happened to have a copy of a particularly magical book that was loosely patterned after the WEC, the "Kids' Whole Future Catalog". https://paleofuture.com/blog/2007/4/27/the-kids-whole-future... I obsessively checked it out of…

I'd love to see it. I had a set of similar books I would pore through as a child like 'Future Cities'[1]. I think it might have been part of a series as well. There was also this big thick book from Readers Digest that had all kinds of things you could build Model boats and Planes (among other things). It's not the 'Crafts and Hobbies' one that's on the internet archive, but it was similar. [1]: https://2warpstoneptu…

I still have my copy of Future Cities and a few more of that ilk. Perhaps it’s time to dig them out of the dusty reaches of my bookshelf.

Re: The whole of the Whole Earth Catalog is now online

#37

Post by mtraven »

pazimzadeh wrote: post #29

I didn't realize it was so commercial. It's just advertisements for hippie? So you can engage in consumerism and still feel good about yourself? The Whole Earth Magazine seems much more interesting than the Catalog

No advertisements, just reviews of things they thought were good.

Re: The whole of the Whole Earth Catalog is now online

#40

Post by kstrauser »

jh00ker wrote: post #34
bane wrote: post #10

I never grew up knowing the Whole Earth Catalog, but in the early '80s I was a precocious elementary school student who practically lived in any library I could get access to. My school library happened to have a copy of a particularly magical book that was loosely patterned after the WEC, the "Kids' Whole Future Catalog". https://paleofuture.com/blog/2007/4/27/the-kids-whole-future... I obsessively checked it out of…

I have a similar story about a set of books from the 80s that weren't as much as inspiration for me and the future, but instead became a major source of forming my own broad general knowledge on core topics: Charlie Brown's 'Cyclopedia. Every week, at the local grocery store, a new volume would be available for purchase, covering a new subject area (Anatomy, Animals, Aircraft, Watercraft, Electricity, Space, Weather,…

I loved those, too! I didn’t have all the volumes, but I read each one through several times.
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