[ Reading time: 1 - 2 minutes ]

LIVE FREE, USA ANNUAL PROGRAMS

Winter Survival Camp (Jan-Feb)

For: Members and guests only

Title: Camp Determination

Location: Campgrounds

Description: A cold weather training camp combining the winter camp experience with classes and testing of winter survival techniques

Spring Survival Education Program (April-May)

For: Public event

Title: Camp Independence

Location: Tippecanoe River State Park

Description: A combination of lectures, demonstrations and hands-on classes in a wide variety of survival, emergency preparedness and self-reliance subjects.

Summer Survival Camp (June – July)

For: Members and gusts only

Title: Camp Liberty

Location: Private land site

Description: A “hard core” survival training exercise based on worst case scenarios for serious and long-term survival.

Family Camp (Aug –Oct)

For: Members and Friends

Title: Camp Unity

Location: Campgrounds

Description: An informal recreational camp providing opportunities to network, share knowledge and swap and trade items.

9/11 Preparedness Programs (Sept-Oct)

Title: Operation Preparedness

For: Public events

Location: Cabela’s, halls, libraries, etc.

Description: Series of survival preparedness presentations focused around national preparedness month

[ Reading time: 4 - 7 minutes ]

LIVE FREE REPORT
Winter 2009-10
LIVE FREE USA, P.O. BOX 3295, MUNSTER, IN 46321

NOTCE! The Post Office Box in Dolton Illinois will be closed by March of 2010. All literature, letterhead, website postings and other references to Live Free, USA must show only the Address below:
LIVE FREE USA, P.O. BOX 3295, MUNSTER, IN 46321

LIVE FREE IS ON THE MOVE!

After several years of slow progress we are finally making real progress again. It’s nice to be able to write about good news for a change. Here is the situation as we end 2009.

1. Membership is up about 20-percent from 07-08

2. Funds are up about 15-percent from the start of 2009 even though we spent more than in past years

3. We held about twice as many activities as the previous year, but all the work was done by the same small staff.

4. We have a number of active younger members with the skills and enthusiasm to become leaders, organizers and instructors in 2010.

Of course, the most important item is number four. Only with more active leadership and staff help can we expand programs, support membership growth and use the funds effectively. That is the challenge for 2010. The plan is to build up the core group, improve the web site, publications and programs and then launch a full-scale advertising campaign to bring Live Free USA to the next level. That level is a nationally recognized force for promoting, teaching and defending individual self-reliance and independence. WE CAN DO THIS! The next few months are critical. We need all of you to keep contributing, keep helping and keep recruiting. Those of you that may have been discouraged in the past need to rededicate and jump back in. We have come so far and worked so hard for so long. Lets not let it go when we have the momentum.

Live Free Report
& American Survivor

Thanks to everyone for your favorable comments on our newsletter. But, it is a problem. The American Survivor (formerly Directions) newsletter is the oldest survival self-reliance newsletter in the USA. It started publication in 1976. Editors are hard to find and harder to keep. After going through our 4th editor in 5-years it got dumped back on me. I am already doing duties as President, conducting classes, and many other tasks. As a result of the added newsletter job, I have not been able to get out Live Free Report since last spring. I also have not run any ads to get more members. The only reason I was able to get the newsletter out through the year was because I did several issues ahead back in November of 08 while on disability from my job. At this point I have no extra issues in the pipeline and few new articles. We still need a reliable editor or we will start to lose somewhere. Hello!

Officers for 2010?

It is time to start working on a slate of officers for 2010. We have some officer doing a great job a few filling in, but unable to give the time needed to do the job, and several posts open. We also have very few Directors with Deputy Directors to help them get it done.

Ø Do not hesitate to step up for a Directorship or Deputy Directorship that is already filled in 2009. Many officers have help posts for over 10-years and would welcome and support a replacement with new ideas and energy.

Ø Do not wait for directions and permission to set up a program or act on an idea. I like to be told about what is being done more than what can be done or should be done. ACT!

A healthy organization should see changes. I would love to see 50% new officers on the slate. Maybe even a few contested offices. I would love to give the annual Members Service Awards to different members in 2010.

Elections are in March 2010, but we need to hear from candidates now.

Website Upgrades Planned

The website is one important area I have had to neglect in order to do the newsletter and the programs. We seem to have a shortage of technical skills in this area so no help was forthcoming. Without a world class website, Live Free USA simply does not exist for a great part of the world. Pouring money into the site without the staff to handle the resulting memberships, and communications would have been a waste. Now we have the opportunity to get back in the game. We have some new technical support and funds that we intend to use to build a site that will serve our members, provide great information and even rais some funds. We hope to be able to provide video programs and let members join and download publications through the site by early 2010.

DVDs and CDs On The Way

Another project slowed by lack of help has been the DVD, CD project. This is intended to get our great collection of survival and self-reliance programs and publications out to the public instead of gathering dust in our cabinets. Soon we will have available.

Ø DVDs with 3 or more US Army (1950s and 60s) survival and medical training films

Ø DVDs with 3 or more Live Free survival and preparedness classes and field programs

Ø CDs with 100 Survival Papers and the book Life, Freedom and Survival by Jim Jones as PDF files

Ø CDs with narrated Power Point class presentations

All will be available by mail order or through the website.

Hey Where Are The Photos?

With all of the action this year, why are there no photos of the Live Free activities in the newsletters? Well, we did get most of it on video tape for the coming DVDs, but NO ONE TOOK ANY STILL PHOTOS! So we don’t have any. We didn’t even have enough photos for the usual annual book. Oh well. Maybe someone will do that next year.

HOLD THESE DATES!

Sunday March 21st 2010 : Live Free USA Annual Meeting and Luncheon at Noon at Cabala’s Conference Center in Hammond IN.

Saturday May 1st 2010: Camp Independence at Tippecanoe River State Park Indiana. Friday (4/30) night check in and Sunday (5/2) morning checkout for cabins. Families and groups welcome. A full schedule of survival and self-reliance programs will be presented.

[ Reading time: 2 - 2 minutes ]

THE ORIGINAL LIVE FREE SURVIVAL PAPERS

ALL 100 PLUS TITLES ON ONE CD ONLY $15.00!
Add $2.00 per set for postage and handling

The best articles from 30-years of Live Free USA newsletters, The best training handouts from Live Free instructors. The best publication written by Live Free authors. These papers range from one page to over 30 pages. Many are illustrated. Subjects include:

1. Food & Water for Survival

2. Nuclear Biological & Chemical Survival

3. Self-Defense Weapons & Tactics

4. Survival Supplies & Equipment

5. Urban Survival Skills

6. General Survival Subjects

7. Survival Planning, Tactics & Philosophy

Send $17.00 payable to Live Free, USA To:

Survival Papers

P.O. Box 342385

Bartlett, TN

38183-238

SURVIVAL PAPERS CONTEST
Enter your paper on any subject related to emergency preparedness, survival, self-defense, or self-reliance. Entries must be in electronic MS-Word compatible format, Illustrations and photos are welcome.

• First Prize $100.00
• Second Prize $50.00,
• Third Prize $25.00

All entries become property of Live Free, USA.

[ Reading time: 4 - 6 minutes ]

Winter Survival

If your survival preparations don’t cover subfreezing conditions you are only 50% ready.

The great majority of survival skills and survival equipment work well in dry and temperate weather. In the dry summer conditions you can survive for a while by simply not doing anything stupid. Moderate clothing and basic shelter items will get you through the chilly damp conditions of late Spring and early Fall. At home, mild weather survival focuses on having safe water and enough food. But winter conditions make survival anywhere an immediate and constant challenge. In winter, Mother Nature tries to kill you. Cold takes no prisoners. Whole armies have been wiped out by General Winter. The survival battle comes down to maintaining the body’s temperature. This is accomplished four actions.

• Generating heat internally through the consumption and metabolization of high calorie food and the necessary water to process it. Consider this fueling your furnace. Food requirements are much higher in cold weather.

• Keeping cold out of the body. Eating cold food, drinking cold liquids and breathing in cold air quickly lower the body’s temperature.

• Preserving body heat. Breathing out warmed air, standing in cold winds, contact with cold ground, getting wet, not wearing adequate clothing and failure to cover the head will burn away calories (heat) and lead to hypothermia
• Gathering heat from external sources. Getting into a warm place, standing in the sun, drinking warm liquids, eating hot food, standing by a fire, breathing warmed air reduces heat loss.

Civilization has focused on providing a warm environment. Our homes are heated. Our vehicles are heated. Even in winter our exposure to cold is brief. Well-feed and warm most of the time we are all in poor condition to survive long-term cold under survival conditions. When we think of survival we think of winter fire, but all animals and some human cultures survive the harshest cold conditions without any form of external heat. They depend on heat conservation and high calorie food metabolism. Two things are certain,

• Inadequately fed and clothed humans who are exposed to sever cold or chilly wet conditions for too long will die

• If you live in most areas of the United States and Canada and have not acquired the skills and equipment for long-term cold weather survival you are at high risk 20 to 70% of the year.

The Body loses heat in 5 ways:

• Respiration: Breathing in cold air, heating it in your lungs and then exhaling the warmed air back out is a significant source of heat loss. A simple facemask, ski mask or muffler over the nose and mouth can conserve some of this heat.
• Evaporation: Sweat and dampness on clothing evaporates and carries away heat. Alcoholic beverages give the allusion of warming while evaporating through the skin and taking away more heat. Rain, snow and even fog will dampen hair skin and clothing to take away you heat.
• Convection: Air (wind) passing over the skin carries away heat. That’s great on a hot day, but deadly in the cold. Get out of the wind ASAP! On the move wear a wind proof poncho.
• Conduction: Nature hates an imbalance. If you are in contact with ground, rocks, metal, snow, etc. that are colder than you are, energy will flow from you to the cold surface. Minimizing contact and good insulation are the keys to preventing this heat loss. Wet clothing loses 90% of its insulation value with water having 240 times the heat conductivity of dry air STAY DRY!
• Radiation: the whole body radiates heat/energy into the environment. Adequate clothing is the only way to reduce this radiation.

Since heat rises the head and shoulders are the greatest source of heat loss and since the brain is most heavily supplied with blood circulation the head is the last part to feel cold. Listen up! Hoods, stocking caps and those big fur caps will save your life. One day we were out in 10 below zero winds. We entered an unheated building and just took off our caps. We immediately started to shiver until we put them back on. Another device for combating radiated heat loss is the “Space Blanket”. These aluminized blankets can be used as ponchos or rigged as shelters. They reflect body heat back to you. They can also be used to catch and reflect campfire, stove heat or solar warmth onto your body. I have recovered from damp cold clothing in this way.

Read the rest of this entry »

[ Reading time: 4 - 6 minutes ]

Website Posting July 2008

From the Presidents Desk

American Survivor May Not Survive

Once again we have no one to do the American Survivor newsletter for our members.

Richard Fleetwood has resigned from three years. Richard did a great job, but became overloaded with other issues and had to give up. He will still keep up our website.

Last year the member that did the mailing of the newsletter had to quit after doing it for ten years. We had hoped to increase the size and frequency of the newsletter from 6 x 8-page issues to 8 x 10 page issues by 2007, but we were barely able to get out what we did. Last year we simplified the layout so that anyone with basic MS-Word skills could create the newsletter. While I can get a few issues to get us to 2009 it will take me away from organizing programs and other Live Free activities. Fewer publications and fewer programs will probably result in loss of membership that we have worked hard to gain.

Our best hope is to get several volunteer editors to do 2 or 3 issues per year. This would remove the pressure from any one parson and even improve the publication. If no one steps forward we will probably loss regularity or ceases publication altogether by mid-2009. We have continuously published a survival newsletter since 1977. It would be a shame to stop right when it is needed the most.

Survival Papers Available On CD

We have over 100 of the best articles from past newsletters and training programs available on CD. These papers range from one page to over 30 pages. Many are illustrated. Subjects include: Food & Water for Survival, Nuclear Biological & Chemical Survival, Self-Defense Weapons & Tactics, Survival Supplies & Equipment, Urban Survival Skills, General Survival Subjects, Survival Planning, Tactics & Philosophy. Send $17.00 payable to Live Free, USA

To: Survival Papers, P.O. Box, 342385 Bartlett, TN 38183-238.

Almost Broke Again!

Outside of membership we get very few contributions. Fund raising programs have been few and far between and even members often attend events without making the voluntary, but needed contribution. Book sales at gun shows and a few regular small contributors keep us going. Printing, advertising, mailing eat up funds faster than the trickle of dues replaces it. Breakout projects like the production of training videos, website upgrades or a bigger batter publication take hundreds of dollars that we don’t have. We have no grants or large contributors at-all. We are looking at a deficit year that will call for cuts in 2009.

Videos Old & New

We are hoping to create and sell a variety of survival education programs on CD and DVD by the end of 2008. This could bring our programs to many more people and solve our funding problems. We have three programs in the works. We are creating new programs that are specifically produced as training videos. We have gathered up dozens of videos of past Live Free training programs that can be converted to CD or DVD. We have several extensive Power Point programs that we will narrate and automate so they can be used by anyone.

Live Free Has A New Address

While our old Dolton Illinois PO box will remain open for another year, we have established a new PO box in Indiana. All future literature will be changed to this address. LIVE FREE USA, P O BOX 3295, MINSTER, IN, 46321.

Choices For Survival

I completed Choices for Survival last year. The book is about 90-pages at 8 ½ x 11 (more in book size pages) and is directed towards the psychology and philosophy of survival and self-reliance as I see it. I put lot of work into it, but only a few friends have seen it. Paper printing is pretty much out of the question because of cost. I may just post the whole thing on the site.

Thanks to all the members who continue to support Live Free and its mission. We struggle on and hope to survive.

[ Reading time: 4 - 6 minutes ]

STORM WARNING
The Perfect Storm of Change and Disaster in the Years to Come and How to Prepare For It
By Jim Jones, CHCM, EMT

In the Twentieth Century, we put in less and less and took more and more. In the Twenty-first Century, survivors will be the ones who do more and more with less and less. The twentieth Century was the time of waste and consumption and luxury. The Twenty-first Century will be the time of conservation and self-reliance.

In the movie “The Matrix” agent Smith (a virtual being) says, “Humans are the only mammal that acts more like a parasite, moving from one area to the next while growing exponentially until all of the resources in one area are gone and the area is dead and then moving on to the next area”. In fact, archeological and anthropological data supports this assertion. The arrival of humans always correlates to extinctions of animal, vegetable and mineral resources. In cases such as islands where the human population was unable to move on, they fought with each other over the little remaining resources and then died out or lingered in misery and poverty.

In the twentieth century, America has populated and consumed itself into a dead end. We were the last place to go. There is no place to move on to. The entire world is now populated beyond the remaining resources. We have a fast growing population seeking higher living standards on a nearly used up planet. There are as many people alive now as there were during the whole of recorded history combined and that will double in the next 40-years. Windmills, hydrogen power, solar power and better farming will buy a little time, but this is a race that humanity cannot win.

The use of corn for fuel has instantly caused a food shortage. Many stores in the US are rationing rice and other staples. Africa is starving and there have been food riots in Egypt, the Philippines, and Mexico. 37 countries have declared being in a food crisis. Some countries have banned exports of grain to assure local supplies. The falling value of the dollar has resulted in more of them being needed to buy the same amount of oil. The drive for biofule is leading to less food crops and massive deforestation in third world countries.

Grain reserves are at a 30-year low. A bad harvest anywhere could be catastrophic. Massive legal and illegal immigration from “have not” to “still have” nations is generating instability, crime and unrest throughout Europe and the US. This will only get worse. In some cases food is the new drugs. Criminal gangs known as “boosters” are beginning to steal food and resell it on the streets. The “black market” and government price controls will be more and more evident over the next 5 to 10 years. Water is the new oil. There are already legal conflicts developing between states in the United States and between many foreign nations over access to water. Water is currently classified as a “resource” belonging to everyone, but that could change. There are motions afoot to classify water as a “commodity” to be owned, bought and sold like oil.

Think about the consequences of that! Even freedom from thirst may not be a human right. Urban sprawl is eating up farmland. When I was a boy, I lived on the edge of Chicago at 97th street south. There were open marshes, wood and farms nearby. Now, 60-years later I have to go out to 225th street to see similar areas, and that is being developed fast. With exponential growth, Chicago’s sprawl could reach the Mississippi by the end of the Century. The oceans are no longer international territory. As resources dwindle nations are reaching out for the ocean and the ocean floors. The Russians recently planted their flag on the sea floor at the North Pole to claim any mineral resources that may be there. Other nations are trying to extend their boundaries or are disputing current limits. There is no doubt that in the future, every inch of the Earth’s land, ice and water area will be claimed by someone. This will of course result in serious border conflicts and probably wars.

Americans once lived the “American Dream” with one working parent, good vacations and benefits while buying with cash and saving regularly. Today it takes two working parents taking few vacations with few benefits and high debt to desperately hang on to a vanishing dream. As the late George Carlin said, “we spent money we didn’t have on stuff we didn’t need” and know we are broke with a lot of junk. The politicians will continue to try to fool the public with smoke and mirrors to get reelected and since false hope gets more votes than hard choices, the issues will not be faced. So there will be an ever-increasing series of ups and downs, but the downs will always be greater than the ups. The elite will thrive, the unprepared will perish and the prepared will survive and stay free.

What Will Happen?
Read the rest of this entry »

[ Reading time: 1 - 2 minutes ]

Hi members, friends, and visitors,

After quite a few months of other projects taking precedence, I’ve finally started the update to the latest software tools for our website here. We’ve just updated this site to WordPress 2.5.1, and updated all of our plugins as well.

Chat will be coming back online shortly, with a better secured version, and we’ve looking at upgrading our Message forums to a new and difference package. More on that later.

Current tools, as we’ve got installed and updated as of tonight, give us audio and video players built into our website, and many new tweaks. Future tools to be installed over the next month include store management software to handle the Survival Papers, photo gallery software for us to share years worth of our projects, new video productions that will appear here on the site, and also be available for download, or on DVD, and many new and cool things.

We’re also setting up a new members only section on the website for managing tons of new content. The information on how to use this will appear in one of the next few newsletters that get mailed out.

So, stay tuned, and thanks for your long time support of Live Free, and this website.

Rich
SIte Administrator, Live Free Publications Director

[ Reading time: < 1 minute ]

Updated pages. As of 12/28/2007 I have updated the following pages:

“Events” now lists the 2008 programs as they are scheduled at this time

“Survival Stuff” has a number of new items added

“Live Free Report” now has the most recent issue posted

“American Preparedness Survey” now has the results of the 2-year survey.

 We are looking at ways to provide you with on-line training programs and our new electronic publication “Choices for Survival” one of the few books that looks at the psychological and philosophical aspects of personal and human survival in the 21st century.

[ Reading time: < 1 minute ]

[ Reading time: 2 - 3 minutes ]

From the Presidents Desk

   We are at a very critical point in the development of Live Free, USA.  We have reorganized and we have the best “core group” since the early 1980’s.  We have increased membership and the level of activities.  But we still have difficulty getting the American Survivor out on time even 6-times a year and membership outside the Midwest is less than it was in the 1980’s.  Some of our founding members are ready to retire, but newer members are not stepping up to take on the challenges.  Live Free, USA is the oldest and most respected survival and self-reliance advocacy organization in the USA (maybe the world).  We defined the philosophy in the 70’s, defended it in the 80’s and maintained it through the 90’s until it is now “main stream” accepted thinking.  We should be moving towards becoming a major organization with paid staff and a formal office and/or training center.  We are moving in that direction, but we could also fade way.   Live Free, USA was created in the 20^th Century, but it is obvious that its primary mission is to save life and freedom in the 21^st Century.  There simply is no comparable organization with our mission.   The next 12 to 18 months are critical.  We cannot simply continue our current level of actives, publications and funding.  We must grow exponentially and develop a whole new core of officers, instructors and organizers.  Look at our mission.  Think about how important preparedness and self-reliance are to the preservation of independence and freedom today and tomorrow.  Think about what will happen to the unprepared and the dependent as the predictable economic, political and environmental events impact future generations. How important can Live Free, USA be? 

IT ALL DEPENDS ON YOU!