Post by billmasen on Jul 5, 2020 2:43:12 GMT -6
In Light of a Global Pandemic, So-Called Preppers Don't Look Extreme After All
'The prepper community promotes the idea that in the time of crisis, we are an asset to our community’
Bailey Basham
May 28, 2020 5 AM
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Illustration: Molly Brooks
Franklin Horton’s grandfather had a lot of stories. Some were funny, he says, and there were lots about the good old days — not uncommon among stories from grandparents. But one story in particular has stuck with Horton like none of the others.
Back in 1918, when the H1N1 influenza strain commonly known as the Spanish flu was ravaging communities around the world, Horton’s grandfather was 8 years old and living in West Virginia. When the flu hit, his family missed the initial wave — they thought they’d made it out OK. But over the next few weeks, his dad and six of his siblings fell ill, and there was nothing that could be done for them — all seven ultimately died. That was in February 1919, when the ground was still frozen from winter. There was no way they’d be getting a proper burial anytime soon. At 8 years old, now the man of the house, the boy watched as his father and siblings were carried into town, one by one, on the back of a mule. They sat, stacked together in boxcars, until the ground thawed out enough to dig graves.
When Horton was 15, his grandfather passed away — but not before he told a few more stories. Horton says one of the most important things he learned from his grandfather was to be prepared. For what? He wasn’t sure exactly. Perhaps another pandemic. Or it could be a massive natural disaster, a cyber attack or a nuclear war, according to modern-day preppers, as they’re known. But whatever this global event might be, Horton would be ready. His family wouldn’t be among those running out of supplies, or standing in long lines for groceries, or waiting for their mule ride into town.
Horton, who lives less than a half-hour outside Bristol, Tenn., is one of many people across the country who classify themselves as preppers, ready at any moment for disaster. Popularized by television shows like Doomsday Preppers that often depict their subjects as a particular brand of paranoid, these folks have emergency preparedness down to a science.
Over the past three months, the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 has continued to climb nationwide and grocery stores have struggled to keep up with demand. As shoppers hope to find the proverbial pot of gold that is a 24-pack of Angel Soft, many preppers have been kicking back on their stock of supplies.
“A generation back, our elders all had full larders, pantries, cellars and basements,” says Lisa Akers, who has been prepping for the past 10 years. “They put food up in jars, or dried it or cured it to get through the winter. We all need to be ready for situations like this. You can live without a lot of things, but food and medication — and toilet paper, it seems — are not something we can do without.”
My dad, Darryl Basham, has been prepping in one form or another for most of his life. I asked him for a little input for this story. He told me that a co-worker, who is not into prepping, asked him in the middle of the grocery-buying panic, “Well, what does a prepper rush out to buy in times like this?”
My dad’s response was simple: “Not a damn thing.”
For my dad, prepping isn’t a new fad made popular by the partially staged reality shows on Discovery Channel. It’s what he’s always done, and what his parents and grandparents did before him.
“We didn’t just decide one day that we are going to start doing this and become preppers,” he says. “These are things we’ve done for our entire lives. As a kid, my dad would buy a truckload of corn every summer, and my brothers and I were forced to help. We sat all day in the yard under shade trees shucking corn to put up for when we’d need it.”
My mom says the same. Her grandmother’s house — they called her Mamaw — became headquarters in the summer for canning and preserving food. Aunts, uncles and cousins would sit in the garage shucking corn while Mamaw and a few others would be inside, stirring the pots on the stove and listening for the jars to pop. My mom always said when she got older, she would never touch a pressure cooker again. She’d buy her veggies from the store. Dad agreed. But for a young couple just starting out with two growing kids to feed, time-honored alternatives like canning just make sense. Mom knows best, so that must mean Mamaw knows even better, right?
“I swore that I would never do a garden when I got out on my own, but when we got married, our first purchase was a freezer to put up food,” says my dad. “One of the first things we did when we bought our house was put out a big garden. We didn’t become preppers. We’ve always lived this way. Now there’s just a word for it.”
Unlike survivalists, who typically learn to live off the land, preppers prepare to live off of what they’ve put up — but that goes beyond canned veggies and Spam. Preppers are conscious of what it would take to ensure the financial, physical and emotional well-being of their families during a time of struggle.
For my dad, it means thinking far beyond stocking up on rice, beans and canned goods. It means putting up things to keep him busy, like playing cards and his collection of Louis L’Amour westerns. It also means putting back a little bit of liquor, which in “hard times” can be used for sanitizing and bartering — and, of course, drinking. My dad’s pick? Tequila.
“If a major world event happens, I’d be able to trade a small bottle of whiskey for items well above the value of the booze itself,” he says. “Then, I’ve got my garden, which I love. That’s always an easy way to pass the time.”
At the house I grew up in, my dad has apple, peach and plum trees, as well as blueberry, raspberry and blackberry plants, planted throughout the 1-acre backyard. He says all of these plants will produce for years to come, and things like the garlic and celery plants will come back every year.
“There’s a rosemary bush down at the end of the house that’s probably 4 feet tall and 5 feet wide,” he says. “If it came right down to it, I’ve got all the seeds put up to do a huge garden. The whole backyard could become a garden, and there is plenty of propane for the grill so we could put a pot on the burner to can our veggies. Consider a grid-down situation: At first, it’d be about harvesting deer, turkey and other small game, but once everybody starts doing that, it won’t be long until we’re on a diet of just veggies and whatever meats we have preserved, much like our grandparents did.”
Lijun Song is an associate professor with Vanderbilt University’s Department of Sociology. She says such lessons from grandparents have a significant impact on how someone might respond to potential threats. Song says it’s those lessons that often inform who we are, how we think and what we do.
Song was living in China in 2002 when the severe acute respiratory syndrome (better known as SARS) broke out in the Guangdong province. She says that experience — as well as warnings from her parents, who lived through three years of famine in China — has made her extra cautious as of late.
“These people’s attitudes and behaviors are significantly influenced by their parents’ and grandparents’ living experience and attitudes,” says Song. “Parents and grandparents tend to be strong social contacts for them, meaning that these people know their parents and grandparents well and have closer relationships with them. They have been actively interacting with their parents and grandparents since they were born, and because of that, they are more likely to trust them and listen to the experience, stories and warnings about risks and hard times.”
Contrary to popular belief, not all preppers have bunkers, and not all of them hope for or expect the government to collapse, Horton says. The lifestyle of a prepper is ultimately about self-reliance and personal responsibility. For most, readiness has nothing to do with extremes and everything to do with common sense and looking to the future.
“People will pay into a 401K for years and years so they can pay for all their needs 20 years from now, but maybe they have one squirt of shampoo left in the shower,” says Steven Bird, an author and prepper in East Tennessee. “They’ll be prepared when they’re retired, but they’re not even prepared to wash their hair tomorrow.”
But it doesn’t stop there.
“Liberty was the founding principle of this nation — it’s something everybody wants, but it comes with responsibility,” says Chris Weatherman, a prepper and author based in Florida. “The prepper community promotes the idea that in the time of crisis, we are an asset to our community. A lot of times, we’re the first people to rise to assist others. If everybody is doing the little things, that becomes a big thing.”
Paul Petersen is director of the Tennessee Department of Health’s Emergency Preparedness Program. He says emergency preparedness is always crucial, but particularly so over the past couple of months as Nashville continues to try to rebuild after the tornado while also grappling with COVID-19. Both the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Centers for Disease Control recommend having at least 1 gallon of water per person per day and a three-day supply of food that requires little or no cooking or refrigeration. Petersen recommends having at least two weeks’ worth of supplies put back. (More information about emergency preparedness is available at ready.gov.)
“There’s always groups that will go to the extreme,” says Petersen. “For those with chronic medical conditions, I think having a 30-day supply of medication is important, and of course, for everyone, having food is appropriate. The other things may be a little excessive, but people are doing that as a personal choice, as an insurance policy of sorts. What do you feel like your needs are? If it’s appropriate for you, then it makes sense.”
Horton agrees that there is no need to take drastic measures when preparing for an emergency. But in the event that you have to live off of what you’ve already got, what may once have seemed excessive could become vital. He says just a few things can make a difference.
“You don’t have to devote your whole life to this, or fill your whole house up with canned foods and supplies,” says Horton. “It doesn’t have to be a huge project. Say you go to the grocery store and you need two cans of corn for something. Buy three or four instead. It’s the difference of an extra dollar a lot of the time, and putting up that extra bit of food allows you to have a buffer for emergencies, but also for times when money might be tight.”
Akers and Basham say the precautions they’ve taken over the past several years have brought them peace of mind in the midst of the dumpster fire that is 2020. But as far as looking ahead goes, they hope the rest of the world has been taking notes.
“Personally, this whole thing has shown me some of the weak spots in terms of the things I’ve put back,” my dad says. “[Operations security] is a big thing with preppers — we work hard to be ready for whatever comes our way, and we want to protect that. I’ve got enough to share, and I’m all about helping out — I’ve been telling certain family and friends that if something ever does happen, they’ve got a place to go as long as they’re willing to work. But I’m also ready to protect what we’ve worked hard for.”
This pandemic isn’t the end, Horton says. It’s just another flash in the pan, another reminder of why it’s so important to be prepared.
“But even if it had been that serious, I’d already invested in peace of mind for me and my family. That’s what this is about.”
'The prepper community promotes the idea that in the time of crisis, we are an asset to our community’
Bailey Basham
May 28, 2020 5 AM
1
Tweet
Share
Illustration: Molly Brooks
Franklin Horton’s grandfather had a lot of stories. Some were funny, he says, and there were lots about the good old days — not uncommon among stories from grandparents. But one story in particular has stuck with Horton like none of the others.
Back in 1918, when the H1N1 influenza strain commonly known as the Spanish flu was ravaging communities around the world, Horton’s grandfather was 8 years old and living in West Virginia. When the flu hit, his family missed the initial wave — they thought they’d made it out OK. But over the next few weeks, his dad and six of his siblings fell ill, and there was nothing that could be done for them — all seven ultimately died. That was in February 1919, when the ground was still frozen from winter. There was no way they’d be getting a proper burial anytime soon. At 8 years old, now the man of the house, the boy watched as his father and siblings were carried into town, one by one, on the back of a mule. They sat, stacked together in boxcars, until the ground thawed out enough to dig graves.
When Horton was 15, his grandfather passed away — but not before he told a few more stories. Horton says one of the most important things he learned from his grandfather was to be prepared. For what? He wasn’t sure exactly. Perhaps another pandemic. Or it could be a massive natural disaster, a cyber attack or a nuclear war, according to modern-day preppers, as they’re known. But whatever this global event might be, Horton would be ready. His family wouldn’t be among those running out of supplies, or standing in long lines for groceries, or waiting for their mule ride into town.
Horton, who lives less than a half-hour outside Bristol, Tenn., is one of many people across the country who classify themselves as preppers, ready at any moment for disaster. Popularized by television shows like Doomsday Preppers that often depict their subjects as a particular brand of paranoid, these folks have emergency preparedness down to a science.
“My family, at least up until my grandparents’ generation, were fairly self-sufficient people,” says Horton. “They would have been completely appalled at the government saving them from anything. They were not anti-government, but they felt their safety and security was their own responsibility. People had to take care of themselves and have food put back for lean years. I think there are a lot of people who still hold that belief to be valuable.”
“A generation back, our elders all had full larders, pantries, cellars and basements,” says Lisa Akers, who has been prepping for the past 10 years. “They put food up in jars, or dried it or cured it to get through the winter. We all need to be ready for situations like this. You can live without a lot of things, but food and medication — and toilet paper, it seems — are not something we can do without.”
My dad, Darryl Basham, has been prepping in one form or another for most of his life. I asked him for a little input for this story. He told me that a co-worker, who is not into prepping, asked him in the middle of the grocery-buying panic, “Well, what does a prepper rush out to buy in times like this?”
My dad’s response was simple: “Not a damn thing.”
For my dad, prepping isn’t a new fad made popular by the partially staged reality shows on Discovery Channel. It’s what he’s always done, and what his parents and grandparents did before him.
“We didn’t just decide one day that we are going to start doing this and become preppers,” he says. “These are things we’ve done for our entire lives. As a kid, my dad would buy a truckload of corn every summer, and my brothers and I were forced to help. We sat all day in the yard under shade trees shucking corn to put up for when we’d need it.”
My mom says the same. Her grandmother’s house — they called her Mamaw — became headquarters in the summer for canning and preserving food. Aunts, uncles and cousins would sit in the garage shucking corn while Mamaw and a few others would be inside, stirring the pots on the stove and listening for the jars to pop. My mom always said when she got older, she would never touch a pressure cooker again. She’d buy her veggies from the store. Dad agreed. But for a young couple just starting out with two growing kids to feed, time-honored alternatives like canning just make sense. Mom knows best, so that must mean Mamaw knows even better, right?
“I swore that I would never do a garden when I got out on my own, but when we got married, our first purchase was a freezer to put up food,” says my dad. “One of the first things we did when we bought our house was put out a big garden. We didn’t become preppers. We’ve always lived this way. Now there’s just a word for it.”
Unlike survivalists, who typically learn to live off the land, preppers prepare to live off of what they’ve put up — but that goes beyond canned veggies and Spam. Preppers are conscious of what it would take to ensure the financial, physical and emotional well-being of their families during a time of struggle.
For my dad, it means thinking far beyond stocking up on rice, beans and canned goods. It means putting up things to keep him busy, like playing cards and his collection of Louis L’Amour westerns. It also means putting back a little bit of liquor, which in “hard times” can be used for sanitizing and bartering — and, of course, drinking. My dad’s pick? Tequila.
“If a major world event happens, I’d be able to trade a small bottle of whiskey for items well above the value of the booze itself,” he says. “Then, I’ve got my garden, which I love. That’s always an easy way to pass the time.”
At the house I grew up in, my dad has apple, peach and plum trees, as well as blueberry, raspberry and blackberry plants, planted throughout the 1-acre backyard. He says all of these plants will produce for years to come, and things like the garlic and celery plants will come back every year.
“There’s a rosemary bush down at the end of the house that’s probably 4 feet tall and 5 feet wide,” he says. “If it came right down to it, I’ve got all the seeds put up to do a huge garden. The whole backyard could become a garden, and there is plenty of propane for the grill so we could put a pot on the burner to can our veggies. Consider a grid-down situation: At first, it’d be about harvesting deer, turkey and other small game, but once everybody starts doing that, it won’t be long until we’re on a diet of just veggies and whatever meats we have preserved, much like our grandparents did.”
Lijun Song is an associate professor with Vanderbilt University’s Department of Sociology. She says such lessons from grandparents have a significant impact on how someone might respond to potential threats. Song says it’s those lessons that often inform who we are, how we think and what we do.
Song was living in China in 2002 when the severe acute respiratory syndrome (better known as SARS) broke out in the Guangdong province. She says that experience — as well as warnings from her parents, who lived through three years of famine in China — has made her extra cautious as of late.
“These people’s attitudes and behaviors are significantly influenced by their parents’ and grandparents’ living experience and attitudes,” says Song. “Parents and grandparents tend to be strong social contacts for them, meaning that these people know their parents and grandparents well and have closer relationships with them. They have been actively interacting with their parents and grandparents since they were born, and because of that, they are more likely to trust them and listen to the experience, stories and warnings about risks and hard times.”
Contrary to popular belief, not all preppers have bunkers, and not all of them hope for or expect the government to collapse, Horton says. The lifestyle of a prepper is ultimately about self-reliance and personal responsibility. For most, readiness has nothing to do with extremes and everything to do with common sense and looking to the future.
“People will pay into a 401K for years and years so they can pay for all their needs 20 years from now, but maybe they have one squirt of shampoo left in the shower,” says Steven Bird, an author and prepper in East Tennessee. “They’ll be prepared when they’re retired, but they’re not even prepared to wash their hair tomorrow.”
But it doesn’t stop there.
“Liberty was the founding principle of this nation — it’s something everybody wants, but it comes with responsibility,” says Chris Weatherman, a prepper and author based in Florida. “The prepper community promotes the idea that in the time of crisis, we are an asset to our community. A lot of times, we’re the first people to rise to assist others. If everybody is doing the little things, that becomes a big thing.”
Paul Petersen is director of the Tennessee Department of Health’s Emergency Preparedness Program. He says emergency preparedness is always crucial, but particularly so over the past couple of months as Nashville continues to try to rebuild after the tornado while also grappling with COVID-19. Both the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Centers for Disease Control recommend having at least 1 gallon of water per person per day and a three-day supply of food that requires little or no cooking or refrigeration. Petersen recommends having at least two weeks’ worth of supplies put back. (More information about emergency preparedness is available at ready.gov.)
“There’s always groups that will go to the extreme,” says Petersen. “For those with chronic medical conditions, I think having a 30-day supply of medication is important, and of course, for everyone, having food is appropriate. The other things may be a little excessive, but people are doing that as a personal choice, as an insurance policy of sorts. What do you feel like your needs are? If it’s appropriate for you, then it makes sense.”
Horton agrees that there is no need to take drastic measures when preparing for an emergency. But in the event that you have to live off of what you’ve already got, what may once have seemed excessive could become vital. He says just a few things can make a difference.
“You don’t have to devote your whole life to this, or fill your whole house up with canned foods and supplies,” says Horton. “It doesn’t have to be a huge project. Say you go to the grocery store and you need two cans of corn for something. Buy three or four instead. It’s the difference of an extra dollar a lot of the time, and putting up that extra bit of food allows you to have a buffer for emergencies, but also for times when money might be tight.”
Akers and Basham say the precautions they’ve taken over the past several years have brought them peace of mind in the midst of the dumpster fire that is 2020. But as far as looking ahead goes, they hope the rest of the world has been taking notes.
“Personally, this whole thing has shown me some of the weak spots in terms of the things I’ve put back,” my dad says. “[Operations security] is a big thing with preppers — we work hard to be ready for whatever comes our way, and we want to protect that. I’ve got enough to share, and I’m all about helping out — I’ve been telling certain family and friends that if something ever does happen, they’ve got a place to go as long as they’re willing to work. But I’m also ready to protect what we’ve worked hard for.”
This pandemic isn’t the end, Horton says. It’s just another flash in the pan, another reminder of why it’s so important to be prepared.
“But even if it had been that serious, I’d already invested in peace of mind for me and my family. That’s what this is about.”