Comment by bane
2 years ago
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 the library, pouring over page after page of exciting future and near future advancements, and in my little mind seeing a clear path from the Space Shuttle to the city of the future printed on the cover. It was one of those breathless books that showed humanity figuring out how to engineer every natural process, picture upon picture of far off space stations intermingled with then current hydroponics gardens and concepts well beyond that.
I found myself competing with at least one other child and the book never hit the shelf but for a few minutes as it was almost on permanent loan in somebody's backpack. My mother looked for a few weeks trying to find where to buy it for me, but never found a bookstore with it. It was like an object sent from another dimension, mean to teach children and guide them to an inevitable future Utopia.
It worked. I've worked in technology and R&D my entire career. I've yearned to bring about that future.
A few years ago, thinking back to this formative codex, I went about trying to find it and happened to buy a copy on Ebay which set about a small project to get the equipment together to scan it and put it up on the internet archive as no digital version of the book exists to my knowledge. I'm almost there, but haven't quite gotten everything lined up.
Many years later, I learned about the WEC and it immediately hit me that this was the adult version of the feeder league I had been participating in as a child.
I can't believe the WEC is out there now. I need to get my crap together and get the Kid's Catalog up as well.
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!
I had the Marshall Cavendish Tree of Knowledge - a collectible encyclopedia week by week.
This is one of the few areas where paper really wins. You get concentrated information in one physical object with hard boundaries which arrives on a regular slow schedule. You have plenty of time to read it thoroughly and start thinking and imagining.
The web is a constant hurricane of distractions. Wikipedia has far more information than any paper encyclopedia, and in a superficial sense it's far more accessible. But there's always more, and always something else. You firehose it, forget most it, and don't get the bigger picture or the implied narrative linking everything together.
I had the same thought. I initially believed that the Web would be the replacement for the Catalog, but it really isn't - it lacks curation. I've never really found any place on the Web with a similar level of curation; maybe OpenCulture, but even that's kind of a firehose. If anyone knows of any places out there, I'd love to hear recommendations.
There's another benefit of an encyclopedia set of books over Wikipedia: in the physical process of looking up a desired topic in a book, you can stumble upon COMPLETELY unrelated topics as you flip through the pages. This serendipitous effect led to reading random encyclopedia articles for HOURS as a kid, an interaction that's hard to replicate with Wikipedia today. Sure there's Wikipedia:Random [0], but you have to intentionally access it.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Random
Just ordered this (used) for my 7-year-old grandson after reading your review. We thank you!
N.B. There are many used sets available on eBay/Poshmark/Mercari/Amazon etc.
Full disclosure, they're from the 80s so they're out of date on some topics (space, aircraft, etc.) and there's some occasional insensitive language, e.g. "stupid".
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I loved those, too! I didn’t have all the volumes, but I read each one through several times.
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://2warpstoneptune.com/2014/03/04/usborne-publishing-th...
The entire Usborne series of books was eye-opening to me when I was a kid: the future, how to be a spy, science experiments. They were translated to Spanish by Editorial Plesa.
I did eventually find the book I was looking for. It was "The Reader’s Digest Book of Things to Make and Do"
https://bookreviewers.online/2018/07/17/things-to-make-and-d...
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.
If you can use help with the scan, let me know. I'm in the Bay Area.
Similar story : Growing up , my mother bought us an encyclopedia set (in Spanish) hardcover set with blue covers , where each volume was named after a question, and there were at least 8 with names like:
What? When? How? Why? Who? Where? etc
The questions would range from the "how do planes fly" , to "who discovered gunpowder?". They would have illustration, which was super helpful to picture steam power, and the Cretacean period duration relative to other periods, etc. It was all in color so I suspect they have aged well. I remember coming back to certain questions over and over. Some that I still remember - "When did the universe begin?" "What happened to the dinosaurs?".
IN short I cannot recommend this set enough. I tried to google, I'll need to come back and post it once I find the original that is hanging out at a relative's library.
I kept taking the Whole Mirth Catalog out of the library as a kid.
It’s on the Internet Archive! :D
beautiful reminiscence - my question is: where do people influenced by this stuff collect? I suppose its everywhere - you get those once in a blue moon encounters (hello to chap I met in Bulgaria who was travelling around the MIddle East learning the Oud and would regail tales of late 80s / early 90s san francisco). I'm in Europe - a bit dissatisfied - but buzzing.
Please do. Haven’t thought about this book in decades. Wow.