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Old-school skills boys can learn http://www.northjersey.com/page.php?qstr=eXJpcnk3ZjczN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXkzMTMmZmdiZWw3Zjd2cWVlRUV5eTcxODg3MDcmeXJpcnk3ZjcxN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXk3 http://tinyurl.com/2b5oqa Sunday, September 2, 2007 By JIM BECKERMAN STAFF WRITER Do you know how to ... Skim stones? Build a go-cart? Hunt fossils? Make a periscope? Recognize cloud formations? Fish? Fold a paper airplane? Tie a knot? Use a slingshot? Erect a treehouse? If you're male, age 45 or older, chances are the answer is yes. Or was, once. And if you're under 45 ...? Well, maybe you know how to build a Web page. "The Dangerous Book for Boys," by British brothers Conn and Hal Iggulden, created a minor sensation in England last...

Picture a world where your father walks with you down a starlit road, pausing to point out Orion. He recites Robert Frost, knows how a battery works—and all the rules about girls. "The Dangerous Book for Boys," by brothers Conn and Hal Iggulden, is peaking on Amazon's best-seller list (No. 5 last week) by recalling just that world. The compendium of trivia, history and advice is geared toward preteen boys, but it's found a surprising audience in men in their 30s and 40s, too. The book's marbled endpapers, archival illustrations and dry, humorous tone ("excitable bouts of windbreaking will not...

When I had a son of my own six years ago, I looked around for the sort of books that would inspire him. I was able to find some, but none with the spirit and verve of those old titles. I wanted a single compendium of everything I'd ever wanted to know or do as a boy, and I decided to write my own. We began with everything we had done as kids, then added things we didn't want to see forgotten. History today is taught as a feeble thing, with all the adventure taken out of it. We wanted...

The Final Word: Maybe it's time to let boys be boys — outside http://www.usatoday.com/life/columnist/finalword/2007-05-01-final-word_N.htm http://tinyurl.com/ythtr3 By Craig Wilson, USA TODAY May 1, 2007 E-mail Craig Wilson at cwilson@usatoday.com

JOSEPH GALLO, 10, of Santa Cruz, Calif., is well armed in the battle against childhood boredom, with a bedroom arsenal that includes a computer hooked to the Internet, a DVD player, two Game Boys, as well as an Xbox and GameCube. But in recent weeks, the hum of that war room of machinery has quieted because Joseph has acquired a new playtime obsession that would have seemed quaint even in his parents’ day: marbles. But lately, a number of educators like Mr. Cohill, as well as parents and child-development specialists are trying to spur a revival of traditional outdoor pastimes,...

The Dangerous Book for Boyshttp://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,20058973-5003900,00.html http://tinyurl.com/or3b2 Christopher Bantick 12aug06 The Dangerous Book for Boys By Conn Iggulden and Hal Iggulden HarperCollins, 400pp, $39.95 UNAMBIGUOUSLY blokey, The Dangerous Book for Boys will have many fathers, or even grandfathers, remembering their days with crystal sets and billycarts. But are such things dangerous? According to the brothers Iggulden, who have in place of an introduction a piece called I Didn't Have this Book When I Was a Boy, boyhood "is all about curiosity". But the kind of curiosity here is of a certain age and time. There's nothing wrong with a fair swish...

The 'Dangerous' book puts girls on the side http://www.star-telegram.com/408/story/80188.html By JILL LAWLESS THE ASSOCIATED PRESS LONDON -- Nostalgia ain't what it used to be. In these frenzied, media-saturated times, the lure of a simpler past is more powerful than ever. That may explain the success of The Dangerous Book for Boys, a deliberately retro tome that has become the publishing sensation of the year in Britain. Exuding the brisk breeziness of Boy Scout manuals and Boy's Own annuals, The Dangerous Book is a childhood how-to guide that covers everything from paper airplanes to go-carts, skipping stones to skinning a rabbit....