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Sunday, December 20, 2015

A Letter To "The Science Guy" And Planetary Society CEO Bill Nye

December 20,2015
Bill Nye
Chief Executive Officer
The Planetary Society
60 South Los Robles Avenue
Pasadena, California 91101
Dear Bill:
          In September of 1996 I hit bottom. I found myself living in a homeless shelter and earning $8.00 per hour at an exploitation job. I was approaching 48 years of age with little or no prospects in life.
          In the month of September, 1996 I joined the Planetary Society. Prudent and practical people would throw up their hands in despair! They would protest that paying your annual dues was an imprudent expenditure for a man in my circumstances.
         My circumstances in life have improved considerably. In September of 2016, I will have the honor of being a member for twenty years. I have always been very proud of what you have accomplished and new frontiers that you always open. I was honored to have developed a friendship (from afar most of the time) with Dr Louis D. Friedman.                                                                                                          2/…
         
Bill Nye                                           Page Two                           December 20, 2015
         Recently I took my wife and our daughter to see The Martian. Yesterday I went to see Star Wars The Force Awakens. Not only did I see a great film. I also saw several previews of high-budget science fiction films coming out in 2016. This morning I was reading The New York Times book section. I saw that the book The Martian had been on the best seller list for an astounding 28 weeks. This tells me that a lot of people all over the world are, as the old saying goes, “putting their  hard-earned money where their mouth is” and showing keen interest in space exploration.
     I have one sincere question for you. It comes from the heart. There is no sarcasm or critical thought in it.
“Why hasn’t all of this interest in space travel, etc. translated into a ground swell of support for both manned and unmanned space exploration?”
       Please put this one question to everyone in the office. And keep up the good work!
With kindest regards,

-Jack Waldbewohner
Cc; file


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