I’m guessing this is the article but I don’t see the bit about a chemistry set for girls.
Maybe Hollandaise sauce is an acid-base reaction.
I can’t view the online article atm but the part about the girls’ chemistry set is a caption for one of the pictures on pg. 38 of the magazine. Quote: “Gilbert’s 1958 [Lab Technician set for Girls] was a nice gesture but had no chemicals.” Judging by the picture on the front of the box it had a microscope for viewing household cleaning agents up close.
The quote about the girls’ chemistry set is in the teal box on the first page.
Something else that I thought was funny about the article are the pictures of kids on the early chemistry sets: the boys are all wearing ties. Such a different world from casual America.
Ah. I was looking for something more substantial in the hopes that they’d explain the rationale behind “no chemicals”.
Another Jart accident person checking in. I reared back to throw it, but didn’t release it quick enough. Right through my foot it went. All the way through. I remember standing there looking at it going “Ow, that hurt”, but not immediately doing anything. When I pulled it out I had a nifty mini geyser of blood follow. My mom nigh on passed out. Ended up with two stitches on the top of my foot, one on the bottom.
What’s the toy with the orb on a string - you hold it out in front of you and wind up the string? My nephews had one and BOTH whacked themselves in the faces.
Not really a Christmas toy, but does anyone remember tire swings? I mean old, nasty dirty tire swings over creek beds, rocky ravines, concrete…
I got my first set of stiches at the age of 6 as the tire swing I was on broke and I feel into the creek bed. Next day somebody had taken the two broken peices of rope and tied them back together. You would have thought 7 stiches on my elbow would have stopped me, but I jumped right back on the damn thing…
good ol’ times.
Dad put tires on our swing set. He’d clean them, cut off most of the tread so all that’s left was the sides and a seat, then hook 'em up.
omg i remember having one or 2 of those! 
speaking of fireworks, i used to shoot bottle rockets into the pool at night, they would explode underwater with a flash and splash. until the time i shot one too close to the filter box and it got sucked into the strainer and then exploded! :smack:
Of the ones mentioned here Creepy Crawlers bring back the fondest memories. And I too had more than one bad burn from them.
I was (well and still am) fascinated with glow-in-the-dark stuff and one of my fondest memories was when my grandmother bought me glow-in-the-dark goop! She was quite poor and so I’m sure this was a bigger extravagance than I knew. (Although since we rarely got things other than birthdays or Christmas, I am sure I had some inkling.)
The new and improved version is out there and out of nostalgia I damn near bought a set.
Not exactly dangerous, but the name of this game certainly sounds painful: Ball Buster. :eek:
This thread has stimulated my memory. Anyway, pop guns were once very popular. I had a rather well-made metal one shaped like a pirate pistol. When you pulled the trigger, a string would pull a cork into the barrel, then as the trigger met the handle, the cork would pop out loudly.
So I first cut the string and shot the cork at whatever. Then I got the idea of combining my rocketry experiments and chemistry set with the gun. I carefully poured a propellent mixture in the barrel, then stuck a lit wooden match in a metal prong (that had held the string). When I pulled the trigger, the zinc/sulphur mixture shot out in a cloud that met the match flame. Very pirate-like, I thought.
I seem to have been a bit of a menace.
I had a Thingmaker, a woodburning set and an Easy Bake Oven.
I spent a good part of my childhood burning the shit out of myself.
He’s got an average family: 2.5 children.
My sister and I used to put the clackers around our necks so the balls would fit into our little training bras. 
We were the perkiest little girls in junior high,
Remember the resin grapes that were popular table decorations in the '60’s? Well my mom set up a little business making those for people and she also made clackers! We had dozens in every color, she sold them to the neighborhood kids for fifty cents. I think I remember that she had to mix the resin just right or they would shatter.
I loved the fragil glass molds. I used to plant things in them and use them for ladybug holders.
My little brother could not remember the word clackers and would call them KNOCKERS everytime!
I seem to remember a gun that shot little yellow round rubber BBs at high velocity, they stung like hell.
Had a Creepy Crawlers Thingmaker.
Also Incredible Edibles.
BB Gun.
Chemistry Set.
Wrist rocket.
Lawn Darts.
Clackers.
Pretty much every toy mentioned, in fact.
Yet the only “toy” with which I ever seriously hurt myself was Flexible Flier sled. I had to have my scalp stitched shut and my nose reconstructed. I haven’t been on a sled again since.
Couple years ago, a kid I know got one of the new thingmakers for Xmas. It sucked. The lightbulb doesn’t provide enough heat to properly solidify the goop.
This thread would not be complete without mention of the Wham-O Superball, made of amazing Zectron… especially the original 2 inch ones of 1965. What’s more fun than 50,000 lbs. of compressed energy? You could take a persons eye out 5 blocks away with these little powerhouses. I launched more superballs into space attempting to test the claim that they could leap a 3-story building. It was true! Most of mine never came back, and are probably still circling the planet.
I remember playing with a toy that consisted of a tube of toxic goo with noxious fumes and a straw. It may have been called Super Elastic Bubble Plastic. You put a blob of goo on the straw and blow your own toxic balloons. Then when you are done, you can wad it up into a small gum-like blob. Dangerous by todays standards on so many levels! Todays kids would chew the toxic gum. We knew better.
Click Clacks… We called them “Clackers” around here. I remember in Jr. High, the boys made them in shop class and sold them to the other kids. Teachers hated them. The school halls were filled with the sound of hundreds of clackers going at once.
According to Wikipedia:
Clackers
Clackers were eventually discontinued after children got injured whilst playing with them: besides being fairly heavy and fast-moving, the spheres, being made of hard acrylic plastic, could shatter upon striking each other, presenting a safety hazard.
There is a recurring urban legend that the clacker spheres were made of glass, although no one has ever produced an actual glass set. The confusion may have arisen because many sets were made of transparent colored acrylic which resembled glass.
When my father was working at Cape Canaveral in the mid-60s, he and a co-worker managed to toss a Superball off the top of the VAB. Unfortunately, they lost track of them on the way down, so they didn’t know how high the balls bounced. They wanted to try inside, but knew that would be a Bad Idea[sup]TM[/sup].