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Survival Food Storage to Prepare for Even Tougher Times

Why do people begin to learn about survival food storage?

When I was a much younger man in the 1970s, many people became interested in survivalism.

For one thing, it was to some extent an outgrowth and spreading of the hippie "back to the land" movement of the late 1960s. Groups like Stephen Gaskin's The Farm in Tennesee proved that it was possible to succeed in the low-tech life. (I just found The Farm's website. I'd thought The Farm disbanded years ago -- I was wrong.)

MOTHER EARTH NEWS was founded in 1970 to provide practical information to the many communes, couples and individuals who were buying up farm land and working it.

The 1970s were economically turbulent times, with gas lines, skyrocketing commodity prices, weekly food price increases, high unemployment and high inflation at the same time ("stagflation") -- which the economic textbooks said couldn't happen, but it did then -- and great discontent with the government.

Even the "silent majority" who believed in America had a hard time. Nixon had to resign office in disgrace. The communists took over Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia while our helicopters left crowds of our friends behind to suffer death and torture for choosing democracy over socialism. Ford's "solution" to high prices was to pass out Whip Inflation Now (WIN) buttons.

People voted for Jimmy Carter for president in disgust with such Republicans, only to have him advise us to wear sweaters with our thermostats turned down low. Not to mention letting Iran be taken over by Islamic fanatics and see him look helpless and weak as the ingrates held our embassy personnel captive for 444 days and while calling Carter the Great Satan.

As Federal Reserve Chairman slammed the brakes on inflation by jacking interest rates up to nearly 20% . . .

The price of gold went from $35 in 1972 to $800 by about 1980. The stock market plummetted in 1973 and 1974, and remained below its 1966 high of about 1,000 until 1982.

In such an uncertain time, doomsday scenarios became common. Books on how to survive an economic apocalypse became bestsellers. People rushed to buy pre-1965 silver coins. Some bought cabins in the backwoods and stocked them with gold, guns and food.

Many other people could not rush off to rural Montana, but did learn about and stock up on disaster foods and supplies.

Myself, at one point I had several barrels of red wheat berries in my basement along with a hand grinder to make flour with. I don't think I ever baked a decent loaf of bread, but I used the flour for pancakes.

I'm not the first one to notice the eerie parallels between 2009 and the late 1970s. During last year's election I took notice when candidate Obama said that Americans would have to learn to use less energy.

The time may come, and sooner than I think, when I'll wish I still had some of that wheat. Get your survival food bars, MREs, freeze dried food and survival food storage projects in gear. The 1970s didn't end with an economic collapse, but we just barely missed one in the fall of 2008. How long can we keep dodging these bullets?