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Dear Friends,
We are living through one of those moments when the worst of human activity is blatantly on display.
And yet human beings are also capable of extraordinary things! — wisdom, courage, compassion, and ideas that change how entire generations think and live.
For over fifty years New Dimensions Radio has been broadcasting in exactly this spirit. Over these five decades we have recorded ground-breaking conversations with Joseph Campbell, HH the Dalai Lama, R. Buckminster Fuller, Ram Dass, Maya Angelou, Andrew Weil, Stewart Brand, Joanna Macy, Barbara Marx Hubbard, and thousands of others.
These are the artists, scientists, doctors, and philosophers who have shaped the holistic health and consciousness movements, and the inner and outer lives of millions.
A Priceless Legacy
In 1973, Michael Toms and I founded New Dimensions Radio in San Francisco.
What started as a weekly show on one local station grew into the longest-running independently produced interview program on public radio, carried by nearly 100 stations across the US, Canada, and New Zealand…and now available worldwide as podcasts, audiobooks, and videos on YouTube.
Today, our archive holds 4,639 programs. The full collection covers an extraordinary range of human inquiry: consciousness, healing, physics, mythology, indigenous wisdom, the arts, politics, and the future of civilization.
Dr. Roberto Trujillo, of Stanford University Libraries, has called it “one of the most extraordinary archival collections” he has encountered in his career as a curator. Others have termed it “The Alexandria Library of the 21st Century.”
But right now, 692 irreplaceable conversations are in danger
In recent years we have devoted much of our time and limited means to digitizing and restoring many of our classic recordings. 692 have been digitized from their original tapes, but they’re not playable and can’t be made available to the public until they’ve been properly restored.
Each program requires approximately sixteen hours of careful, hands-on restoration to be brought back to life. It's a monumental task, and one that goes far beyond what our everyday funding can support.
What’s in These Recordings:
- Joseph Campbell showed the world that beneath every culture runs the same deep river of story. Five of his conversations are waiting to be restored, including "The Myth of the Fool."
- R. Buckminster Fuller coined "Spaceship Earth" and spent his life proving that human ingenuity could solve what politics couldn't. Six of his conversations are in the archive, including "Being with Bucky."
- Albert Hofmann, Ram Dass, Timothy Leary, Allen Ginsberg, and John Lilly sat together in 1977 for "LSD: A Generation Later," a conversation between the pioneers of consciousness research that will never happen again.
- Jerry Brown, Frank Herbert, and Captain Edgar Mitchell came together for "Space-Age Humanity.": a governor, the author of Dune, and an astronaut who walked on the Moon, all in one room imagining the future.
- HH the Dalai Lama, Alice Walker, Jack Kornfield, Robert Thurman, and Edward James Olmos explored what compassion actually demands of us in "Compassion in Action."
- Daniel Ellsberg, the man behind the Pentagon Papers, reflected on the world we choose to create in "A World of Our Own Making."
- Werner Erhard, Barbara Marx Hubbard, Marilyn Ferguson, and Patricia Sun gathered in 1979 to ask one question: "The Future: What Will It Be?"
- Linus Pauling, the only person in history to receive two unshared Nobel Prizes, recorded a rare conversation at New Dimensions.
These programs are more relevant today than the day they were recorded. The hunger for depth, for meaning, for voices that speak to what truly matters, has never been greater.
Once restored, they’ll become a permanent resource for the world, hosted on our website and accessible through our distribution partners. Through our collaboration with Stanford University Libraries, they will also be preserved as part of the human record.
▶ See who else has been immortalized in these rare recordings
Here is what your tax-deductible gift makes possible:
- $243 restores one complete program.
- $2,430 restores an entire series of ten programs.
Any funds raised above our goal will go toward making sure these teachings are accessible to as many people as possible.
Every dollar counts. Please donate what you can, and pass this along to anyone you know who would value this project...
With deep gratitude,
Justine Willis Toms
Co-Founder & Host, New Dimensions Radio
About New Dimensions Radio
New Dimensions is an award-winning radio series of deep dialogues with leading-edge thinkers, scientists, artists, healers, ecologists, and spiritual leaders. Founded in 1973 by Justine Willis Toms and Michael Toms as a nonprofit educational organization, New Dimensions has produced over 4,639 programs across five decades. New Dimensions is a listener-supported 501(c)(3) nonprofit. Every dollar donated goes directly to the work of making these conversations accessible.
“I have been listening to New Dimensions as a guide to my own reporting life and my life in medicine; it all fits together into one, and New Dimensions has been my guiding light.”
— Lonnie Shavelson, M.D., author of Medical Aid In Dying
“To whatever degree that I have evolved, I owe much to New Dimensions radio for reaching out into the hinterlands. I never met you but I know you.”
— Marshall, Shreveport, Louisiana
“For 50 years, New Dimensions has been a source of wisdom, and I feel the deep dialogues are more important now than ever. I think New Dimensions is a place that we can tune into to find our way into the next era.”
— Brooke Williams, naturalist, environmental writer, author of Encountering Dragonfly
Michael Toms with Coleman Barks
Organizer
