by Robert Wilkinson
If you don’t know who this pioneer is, well, his life has changed us all!
Jacque Fresco (March 13, 1916 – May 18, 2017) was a futurist, social engineer, structural designer, and author who gave us ideas about sustainable cities, energy efficiency, natural resource management, and the Venus Project, an organization that advocates for a “resource-based economy.” A self-taught genius, his ideas blazed a thousand trails leading to our present ideas about all these subjects and more.
From his entry in Wikipedia, we read:
”... in the late 1930s ...Fresco presented alternative designs and they included both flying wings, and disk-shaped aircraft he referred to as a “flying saucer.” .... Fresco had advanced ideas for airplane design. He gained a reputation according to some commentary of being "a man twenty years ahead of his time."Fresco was commissioned by Earl Muntz to design a form of housing under the conditions that it be low cost, composed of available materials, be functional, and avoid radicalism. Fresco along with his associates Harry Giaretto and Eli Catran then conceived, designed and engineered the project house.
This took place in the summer of 1948. Fresco, then 32 years old, perhaps came closest to traditional career success with this project called the Trend Home. Built mostly of aluminum and glass, it was on prominent display at Stage 8 of the Warner Bros. Sunset Lot in Hollywood. It took 10 men eight hours to construct the Trend Home....
In 1961 … Fresco collaborated on a project, known as the Sandwich House. Consisting of mostly prefabricated components, partitions, and aluminum, it sold for $2,950, or $7,500 with foundation and all internal installations. During this period, Fresco supported his projects by designing prefabricated aluminum devices through Jacque Fresco Enterprises Inc.
In 1994, Fresco incorporated The Venus Project. The Venus Project is presented in its literature as the culmination of Fresco's life work. It is located in central Florida near west Lake Okeechobee about fifty miles northeast of Fort Myers. On its 21.5-acre lot, there are ten buildings designed by Fresco. It is partly a research center for Fresco and Roxanne Meadows and partly an educational center for supporters. They produce videos and literature presenting their goals and ideas. According to their literature, their ultimate goal is to improve society by moving towards global, sustainable, technological social design which they call a "resource-based economy".
… In 2002, Fresco published his main work The Best That Money Can't Buy. In 2006, William Gazecki directed the semi-biographical film about Fresco, "Future by Design.” In 2008, Peter Joseph featured Fresco in the film Zeitgeist Addendum where his ideas of the future were given as possible alternatives.
Jacque Fresco is a true utopian futurist, and has worked his entire life to bring technology and human living into synergetic relationships. By all means, if you want to know more about this remarkable man, please go to the Wikipedia link about. There’s a lot more there, including a list of all Jacque’s books and other offerings.
Thanks for all the visions you’ve dreamed into reality, Pisces. You’re about 100 years ahead of your time, which is a great place to be to offer visions of the future to others who can make them real. May your better ideas spread like wildfire at just the right time in just the right era and create a better world for us all.
If you want to know more about this remarkable centenarian, here’s the link to The Venus Project
© Copyright 2023 Robert Wilkinson
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