My own little Randy Bragg

In the 1950’s during the fears of nuclear war, author Pat Frank wrote the searingly realistic fictional novel “Alas, Babylon” about survival in a small Florida town after the then Soviet Union attacks America with nuclear weaponry.

The story intrigued me as I had never considered what being in that type of scenario would be like. The main protagonist, Randy Bragg, was given a brief warning of the coming nuclear war by his brother, who was a member of the Air Force. Randy had enough time to buy supplies at local stores but did not fully realize what was useful and what was not in a disaster until after the attack. Aside from the effects of the radiation or the luck of being upwind of the blast, Alas, Babylon exposed weaknesses of modern living in an unpowered society. Randy and his small community had to figure it out the hard way.

For instance, most major disasters include a loss of electrical power, either temporary or long-lasting. No refrigeration meant all frozen foods spoil after a time. Randy was able to save some of the fresh meat he bought if thoroughly salted, but most of it had to be cooked and consumed right away simply so it would not be a total waste. Canned goods were best and in hindsight, those were what he should have bought. Paper money was worthless, until eventually bartered as substitute toilet paper. Precious metals were still precious unless radiated, which turned them deadly and therefore unusable. Bartering was the new economy; gasoline could be bartered until it inevitably ran out. Randy lived next to a river and was able to fish now and then to provide food for his little neighborhood group, and rowboats and john boats and small sailboats provided useful travel whereas gas-powered ski boats were dry-docked unless they were cannibalized for parts. Bicycles and walking were the new/old mode of transportation, but even these were subjected to the dangers of thievery and assault.

The entire book turned out to be a guide for survival, entertaining as a fictional story and thought-provoking from a practical standpoint. Although Florida did not include the challenges of other parts of America where all four seasons are in play, it nevertheless underscored the point that any location had its share of difficulties. Suppose we did not live next to a river as Randy Bragg did? Solar power, which was not prevalent at the time the book was written, is now a viable source of energy and could be harnessed to power water well pumps as long as the wells were already dug and the pumps in place. Florida would not likely endure frigid temperatures and snowstorms, but it has occasional hurricanes, terrible seasonal humidity and crocodiles that a typical rancher in, say, Montana, would not find in her backyard. Update to modern times, and one must add ‘extremely large pythons are in Florida’ now.

Let us replace nuclear war for the possibility of something outside our control, like a freak weather phenomenon or an electromagnetic pulse from a sun flare could occur. You read science fiction books and see movies, who is to say those cannot happen? As the winter of 2021 has taught us, emergencies can spring up on us at any point. That is where “Alas, Babylon” comes in.

Randy Bragg made an emergency kit of what he called “iron rations” including different sized batteries, extra bandages, bouillon cubes, instant coffee, and other items that came in handy later. This iron ration idea caught my attention. In certain parts of the Deep South in cold weather, Southerners are known to run out and buy bread and milk at the first snowflake in case the likely formation of ice makes driving the hilly roads impassable. This means every other Southerner is right there in line, buying up the last of the bread and milk ahead of you. If something really catastrophic were to happen, the time to prepare for it is in a period of relative calm and not when/if it happens.

I keep all my supplies in a large, lidded plastic tote that does not take up that much room in the back of my clothes closet. Hopefully, I will never need it. I am not a panicky prepper in the “me-against-the-world” sense, I am a cautious what-would-I-do-if-I-did-not-have-this-thing person, so I put together a “Randy Bragg” rations box of my own. Over the years I discovered that rotating foodstuffs is important if you forget you even have a rations box. In 2017 I came across my “Randy Bragg” while packing to move across country and found some food that had expired back in 2001. Food will always be an ongoing, perishable concern so I leave them out of the tote and keep up with those kinds of items in my pantry. I check my “Randy Bragg” every time I replace the batteries in my smoke detector since some medicines, even aspirin, have an expiration date and lose their potency. The need for regular rotation is a must.

However, items like gauze pads, bandages, medical tape, tweezers, simple thermometers, water purifiers systems, sewing needles and spools of thread, and sealed amounts of salt, pepper and sugar can be safely stored for a long time. Simple hand tools are also a good idea; spare flathead and Phillips-head screwdrivers, a hammer and nails/screws, pliers, various types of knives, rope, an extra pair of scissors, and a tarp can come in handy in emergencies. WD-40 and duct tape should be added as well; there will always be something that needs to get something moving and something else that needs to be held in place. A hand-crank-powered radio is a good idea, as well as pencils, paper, an unopened packet of ink pens, as well as some plastic trash bags, grocery bags and ziplock bags for waterproofing purposes. Can these things be found in an ordinary home toolbox? Yes, of course they can, but a Randy Bragg box provides that extra support when regular supplies are exhausted or get ruined.

I also tossed in a Basic Emergency First Aid and Essentials of Anatomy textbooks from old college classes. If there is no way to Google information and there is a medical emergency, these can be valuable resources. What is the point in having bandages and medical tape if you do not know how to apply them effectively? Why not have something people other than you can readily reference?

In my pantry I have a nearly new, practically full can of Crisco shortening for my yearly pie-making. If I stick a wick or similarly thick piece of cloth down into a can of shortening, it makes a long-lasting lamp that is safe to use indoors! I learned this from Google but if the power grid were out, I would still have a cheap way of lighting my living space. Add an upside-down clay flowerpot on a couple of bricks, and that burning Crisco lamp will also provide heat. Internet access is reduced to the abstract if you cannot access it, so curiosity spurs my discovery of useful information.

I have a can opener in my Randy Bragg since there is nothing more frustrating than having a can of food and no way to access the goods. It is the ordinary things we take for granted that I try to plan for. I do not have space for extra bottles of water, and that is my Randy Bragg’s key weakness. If I needed to bug out for another place, I can put my Randy Bragg in the boot of my car quickly, add whatever other items I might need/want to take with me, and go. Other than copious amounts of water, the only other thing I could not take along is my collection of writings. Everything I write is saved in Dropbox on the Cloud, so I would take my laptop with me and hope the situation is temporary and recoverable. I hope for the best. That is pretty much what planning ahead is all about.

###