I didn't find this topic in the library and thought it might be of interest. For several years, Project Gutenberg has been developing a database of etext and online books available to anyone anywhere free of charge. The main website for Project Gutenberg is: http://promo.net/pg/index.html and explains the entire project, its philosophy, plus links to various mirror sites around the world available for book downloads.

I recently read that more than 5,000 books are currently available from Project Gutenberg, including a lot of classic works. The number of books available on Project Gutenberg increases daily. All works on Project Gutenberg comply with all copyright laws and are fully legal. For homeschoolers, these works seem like valuable educational no cost resources that may help in satisfying home academic efforts. The project also offers worthwhile reading for anyone seeking a change from today's mindless pulp publications.

There is one book that many here may find worthwhile. It's entitled, "Three Acres And Liberty" by Bolton Hall, 1918. As you would expect, the writing style, attitudes and ideas are in keeping with the period. Some things we know not to do today. But many of the principles, suggestions and concepts could have been written yesterday. I think those who are homesteaders, or homesteader wannabes, will find this book interesting and useful. I found myself recognizing that some of the conditions described at the turn of the last century haven't changed a great deal in the last 80 years. What the heck, it's free, so why not download and take a look.

One idea you might think about is to volunteer to type a book onto the Project Gutenberg database. The contact information is available at the website and it might make a nice project for next winter. Just a thought.

Hope this is useful.

-- Ed (ecpubs@lynchburg.net), April 13, 2002

Answers

Love that site. Always glad to hear of a good book that I can download! I find that if I set explorer to largest text size and full screen view I can lean back in my chair and just hit the down arrow key while I read. We have such a tiny library here that i have already exhausted their good stuff. Have you tried the internet public library? http://www.ipl.org/

-- kim in CO (kimk61252@hotmail.com), April 13, 2002.

Hi Kim,

Yes, I have the Internet Public Library bookmarked. It is a good site for both reading selected text and for finding other sites containing information I'm interested in. I wonder how many other "good and useful" library sites there are on the web that would be beneficial to homesteaders? Has anyone prepared a "master list" of such sites? Maybe folks will post the URL's for such sites and we'll all benefit.

-- Ed (ecpubs@lynchburg.net), April 13, 2002.

Here are some links, and think that most have been posted in the past:

Cornell Agricultural, http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/CDL/neh_A.html

Buffalo Birds Woman’s Garden, http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~landc/html/wilson/

Kansas State Univ. Historical Agricultural, http://www.oznet.ksu.edu/historicpublications/

Historical Mountain Men Diaries
-- BC (desertdweller44@yahoo.com), April 13, 2002.

Thank you all SO MUCH!! These are exactly what I have been looking for. I'm so happy I read this thread!

-- Gayle in KY (gayleannesmith@yahoo.com), April 13, 2002.

Thanks for posting this information. I found out about the Gutenberg Project a few years ago when I was searching for Horatio At The Bridge for our Ancient Roman studies.

There are other things available "out there" too. I found some Sherlock Holmes short stories and downloaded them, printed them off and gave them in a notebook to my daughter for her birthday one year.

-- Lavender, Central Maryland (lavenderbluedilly@hotmail.com), April 14, 2002.