I was never in the Boy Scouts. I was, still am, and most likely forever will be, a city slicker. But I always admired the Scouts. I have always wanted to be a Goonie. And I’ve always, always wanted a Junior Woodchuck Guidebook.
Wait, you don’t remember the Junior Woodchuck Guidebook? Let me refresh your memory.
In the Glorious 80’s, when afterschool cartoons were filled with such quality hits like the Thundercats, He-Man, and the Transformers (I’m talking about the original Hasbro cartoons, not the Michael Bay monstrosities), there was a gem of a cartoon called Ducktales. It was part of the Disney afternoon lineup, along with Tail Spin, Darkwing Duck, and Rescue Rangers. 2 hours of glorious Disneyfied cartoony fun.
But Ducktales, in my not-so-humble opinion, stood above the rest. It was the adventures of Scrooge McDuck and his three (grand)-nephews – Huey, Duey, and Louie. They fought bad guys in one episode, went looking for lost cities and treasure in another, and in general went on one adventure after another. All throughout, if they ever got into a sticky situation and couldn’t figure out something or know something, they turned to their Junior Woodchuck Guidebook.
It was a handy-dandy reference tome that seemed to magically have all sorts of useful knowledge – like how to send a coded message, how to crack a safe, how to fix a rocket engine. Sure now we have the internet and Google and Wikipedia, but there’s something to having a physical reference book filled with just the most useful and cool information that any aspiring adventurer would want.
Well, it turns out that I’m not the only one with this desire.
A few years ago, Conn and Hall Iggulden had the same idea and not finding an actual tome of such type, they went out to write one. And The Dangerous Book for Boys is it.
There are no chapters on coding or Instagram or iPhone apps. Instead, it is filled with such useful tidbits such as how to make a bow and arrow, a Navajo code talker’s dictionary, and how to teach your dog cool tricks. It has stories such as the tale of Robert Scott’s expedition to the Antarctic, the story of Douglas Bader, one of the most famous RAF aces of WW2, and famous battles from Thermopylae to Gettysburg. And there are tips on how to talk to girls, play poker, and hunt and cook a rabbit.
Admittedly Google and Wikipedia have access to more information and certainly more modern information, but some of the nuggets in this book are timeless, and it’s the kind of stuff that any 6-12-year-old boy (or girl) would be excited to learn. In fact, in many ways, it’s got the kind of non-digital, real-world knowledge that many kids (and quite a few of us adults) these days sorely lack and wouldn’t hurt to get to know.