ALAN WASSER

WASSER--Alan Bruce. Alan Bruce Wasser died on January 4, 2026, at age 85. At three years old he was admitted to Hunter College's model elementary school for high IQ children. In 1993 he was the co-author of the textbook about Hunter graduates entitled "Genius Revisited, High IQ Children Grown Up." He graduated from the Bronx High School of Science and NYU, where he was admitted to Phi Beta Kappa. Alan went on two Freedom Rides, joined the Peace Corps, and then became a journalist. Besides regular newscasts he hosted a show called "Folk Music Worldwide." Recordings of those shows can still be heard at https://www.folkmusicworldwide.com./ . Later, he was a news writer for ABC News, and the Senior Editor of the team that put WCBS all-news radio format on the air for the first time. After that he joined the National Space Society, and rose to be its CEO. He was the first to propose that human settlement on the Moon might use a permanently sun lit mountain top at the moon's South Pole. Much of Ben Bova's novel "Moonrise" takes place on that mountain, which Bova named "Mt. Wasser." In order to encourage space development, Alan originated the idea of using Lunar land claims to make privately funded, entrepreneurial space settlements profitable. The idea is presented at the website: https://www.spacesettlement.org/. Alan leaves behind his partner Carol Kochman, his daughter and son, Deb Wasser and Dave Brett Wasser, and his grandchildren Savannah and Whittier Vaughan-Wasser. Donations may be made to: TheActorsTemple.org or to AMNH.org, the American Museum of Natural History, where he thrilled his kids with many happy visits.