R. BUCKMINSTER FULLER: 1895-1983

Article Tools

Image Gallery

Print

E-mail

Comments

RSS

During the late 1940's, Bucky was busy working out the calculations for what would be his most famous invention, the geodesic dome. At Black Mountain College, not far from MOTHER's home, the first successful dome was built in 1949. By the mid-1950's, the Harvard dropout was receiving honorary degrees right and left, and was much in demand as a lecturer.

Bucky and Anne were able to build their own geodesic home in Carbondale, Illinois, and the sometimes-poet dedicated this humorous take-off on "Home on the Range" to it:

Let architects sing of aesthetics that bring
Rich clients in hordes to their knees
Just give me a home in a great circle dome
Where the stresses and strains are at ease.

Roam home to a dome, where
Gothic and Roman once stood
Now chemical bonds alone guard our blondes
And even the plumbing looks good.

The late 1960's turmoil eventually led to Bucky's leaving Carbondale, and he resisted becoming a part of the political upheaval of the time ... as always, he abhorred the role of guru. His concern for the world grew more strident, though, as expressed in the volumes Critical Path and Grunch (Gross Universal Cash Heist) of Giants.

In those works, Bucky expressed his opinion that free enterprise works by "ruthless, but often polite, decimation of the unsupportable fractions [of humanity], or leaving the unsupportable fractions to their unhappy fate."

Socialism, on the other hand, he saw as "the theory of austerity for all and sharing of inadequacy with slow mutual approach to certain, untimely demise."

"Every child is born a genius. It is my conviction, from having watched a great many babies grow up, that all humanity is born a genius and then becomes de-geniused very rapidly by unfavorable circumstances and by the frustration of all their built-in capabilities."

"We say sunset ... but there is no sunset ... if you back up and look at earth you see the earth turns."

RSS | Comments | E-mail | Print