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Neither offense taken and nor apology needed, sir; even as I hit the "post" button I thought, "Oh, no, wait, it's not HIS list!" So it's my apology that's due to you, hereby proffered. :-)

I'm glad to see so many Heinleinistas here. The influence he has had on my life is literally incalculable. His ability to hook a reader with the very first sentence was nonpareil; even now, I'll grab at random one of his books, every one of which I've read dozens of times, and still be as enthralled as I was the first time.

After his death his wife moved a couple of miles from my house in Florida, and while I never had the privilege of meeting her in person, we corresponded, and also participated in on-line Heinlein group chats. Maybe it was best that we didn't meet -- I've always had a terminal weakness for redheads, and despite the age difference I probably would have fallen in love with her :-) especially as she was the prototypical Heinleinian SuperWoman!

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PS, I read your post below anent selling 21(!!!) firsts, and nearly had a heart attack! I have his modern firsts, but I'm glad I was able to snag a few of his rarer juvenile firsts as well. That you would even consider giving them to friends is most generous. I'm thinking about being buried with mine, because whether I go UP or DOWN, I'm going to want something to read!

I had a very kind reply from his wife in 1988. I was writing a political commentary column in those days and did one on Bob’s passing. Someone sent her a copy and she wrote to tell me how much she appreciate my words.

Some years ago I had a fire that wiped out all my columns I had scanned into my then computer and floppy disks. I still have the actual hardcopy of the newspapers on the days my columns ran and if my spirit ever gets high enough some day, I’ll go to that back Fibber McGee closet and try to find the one on Bob.

So, here are few of my favorite quotes of his:

A generation which ignores history has no past and no future. (Way too damned true nowadays!)

Everything in excess! To enjoy the flavor of life, take big bites. Moderation is for monks.

One man’s “magic” is another man’s engineering. “Supernatural” is a null word.

You live and learn. Or you don’t live long.

The truth of a proposition has nothing to do with its credibility. And vice versa.

Stupidity cannot be cured with money, or through education, or by legislation. Stupidity is not a sin, the victim can’t help being stupid. But stupidity is the only universal capital crime; the sentence is death, there is no appeal and execution is carried out automatically and without pity.

Autocracy is based on the assumption that one man is wiser than a million men. Let’s play that over again too. Who decides?

Democracy is based on the assumption that a million men are wiser than one man. How’s that again? I missed something.

Men rarely (if ever) manage to dream up a god superior to themselves. Most gods have the manners and morals of a spoiled child.

No state has an inherent right to survive through conscript troops and in the long run no state ever has. Roman matrons used to say to their sons: “Come back with your shield, or on it.” Later on, this custom declined. So did Rome.

The power to tax, once conceded, has no limits; it contains until it destroys.

The United States has become a place where entertainers and professional athletes are mistaken for people of importance. (This was written some 30 years before Michael Vick every owned a dog...)

Luck is a tag given by the mediocre to account for the accomplishments of genius. (I suspect some of ya'll here on FR call me lucky, but I'll not want it engraved on a tombstone till I die! };^b)

Anyone who clings to the historically untrue - and thoroughly immoral - doctrine that violence never settles anything I would advise to conjure up the ghosts of Napoleon Bonaparte and the duke of Wellington and let them debate it. The ghost of Hitler would referee. Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than any other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst. Breeds that forgot this basic truth have always paid for it with their lives and there freedoms.

And lastly from Citizen of the Galaxy written before the electron microscope was commonplace: “Nobody has ever seen an electron. Nor a thought. You can’t see a thought, you can’t measure, weigh, nor taste it- but thoughts are the most real things in the Galaxy.”

Amen, Bob... Amen!