From the Bookshelf of Bound Together…

The Quiet Zone: Unraveling the Mystery of a Town Suspended in Silence

Stephen Kurczy

Start date: March 1, 2023

Finish date: April 30, 2023

Discussion: If the Truth be Known...

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2025 Sept/Oct Nonfiction ~~ Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West by Dee Brown
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What Members Thought

Sep 13, 2021 Diane S ☔ rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: nf-2021

3.5 "Once a given aspect of nature, quiet is facing extinction."

The author is not the only one whoho doesn't own a cellphone. I don't either, or rather I do, but it sits in a drawer, pay as you go, just in case I go alone on a long trip. Which with Covid, hasn't happened and it's doubtful that in the near future, this will change. It's my choice, I prefer not to be constantly bombarded by calls and text messages. When I first started reading this, I thought what a fantastic place, a place that v ...more

58 likes · Like · see review

Dec 24, 2023 ♥ Sandi ❣ rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: bio-auto-memior, z-2023-3500-books, social-issues, contemporary, historical-history, cultural, medical-mental-health, non-fiction, debut, nature-environment

3 stars

Green Bank West Virginia, populace 250, only four hours from Washington D C, in a remote country setting is the home to the National Radio Quiet Zone. It is a ten mile square of no cell phone, no WiFi, no computers, no microwaves, nothing with a high velocity of radio waves. And why is that? Green Bank has erected a radio astronomy observatory that "measures the invisible energy waves raining down on Earth from the heavens". In short - activity of others - on far reaching planets - awaiti 3 stars

Green Bank West Virginia, populace 250, only four hours from Washington D C, in a remote country setting is the home to the National Radio Quiet Zone. It is a ten mile square of no cell phone, no WiFi, no computers, no microwaves, nothing with a high velocity of radio waves. And why is that? Green Bank has erected a radio astronomy observatory that "measures the invisible energy waves raining down on Earth from the heavens". In short - activity of others - on far reaching planets - awaiting to hear from E.T.

Many people flock to this area claiming to be Electrosensitives - those who get sick due to radio waves from things like light bulbs, cell phones, WiFi, microwaves and anything else that generates electromagnetic signals.

Now in essence, this is a great experiment - if it were only working. However, as diligent as the National Alliance is - which oversees the towers - they are unable to prevent even the residents of Green Bank from installing WiFi and carrying cell phones. The towers and Alliance is still in working order today, having gone through the neighboring National Justice Party - meaning a home branch of the White Supremacist neo-Nazi organiztion - and the crumbling of the original tower due to structural issues. But even when the neo-Nazi party was maintaining land there, everyone in the area appears to get along.

Although many newspapers and magazine articles claim that Green Bank is where WiFi is both unavailable and banned, this book disputes that fact by a journalist who spent many months over a two year period embedding himself within the community, interviewing many of its residents, and researching both the area and the towers.

I enjoyed this book, both for its story about Green Bank, and it's connection to some other books that I have read including true crime book The Third Rainbow Girl: The Long Life of a Double Murder in Appalachia. Although this story branched off into the National Justice Party and a couple other less mentioned issues, I did enjoy reading about a place, that if it actually worked, could be a much needed retreat - a Quite Zone. ...more

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Mar 08, 2023 Ruby Grad rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

I really appreciated the writing as the author details his visits to the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank, West Virginia, which is in the midst of a 10-mile "Quiet Zone" to ensure that no radio waves interfere with the telescopes's reception of radio waves from space. When the observatory was built in the 1950's, it was easy to create the quiet zone. Because of the quiet zone, the observatory was able to make many notable discovery in radio astronomy.

But the quiet zone was slo ...more

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May 03, 2023 Mandy rated it liked it

I have mixed thoughts on this one. I would not have picked this one out myself, but read it as part of a book club read. Some of the information was interesting. However, I felt like the subject matter jumped around so much. One moment you would be reading about how bad technology and phones are (that even God doesn't like them); then the next you would be reading about racism and Neo-Nazis, and then the next moment about electrosensitives.

I felt like the "point" of the book jumped around and e ...more

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Jul 18, 2022 Irene rated it liked it · review of another edition

A national radio astronomy observatory was built in West Virginia about seven decades ago. Because it uses radio and microwaves to explore the universe, wifi, cell phones and microwave transmission are not permitted in its vicinity. The author visits the small rural community that lives under this ban to explore the impact of limited connectivity on these people. This ends up being a tour of one place in rural America. We meet violent Nazis, people who suffer from hyper sensitivity to electric s ...more

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