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I really wish I could describe GenZ what it felt like growing up in a miracle. My grandfather on my mother's side was a dentist. He had a grand encyclopedia collection and it was just this incredible thing. You could pick up a random book and go to a random page and just be regaled with information

There was a time where this kind of access was privileged and expensive and reserved for those with means. You would pick up encyclopedia book and understand how much this cost them. And how important it was that you had it collected by experts into a printed page. Information was not free.

On my 7th birthday a traveling encyclopedia salesman randomly showed up. My parents decided to get the set for me and I remember reading them a lot. Probably cost $70 bucks in 1980s money, so that wasn't cheap.

A full set of encyclopedias was probably still about $1000 in 1980s money. That's like $3000 today. I believe the sales pitch was to sell it on installments. $70/month for 2 years maybe?