Not only the Atomic Energy set, can you imagine the Consumber Products Safety Commission getting its hands on a CHEMISTRY set? Why, a child might hurt themselves with all those chemicals. Not ot mention the possibility of cuts from a broken test tube. And the alchohol lamp with its open flame? Now the Erector set. There is a real hazard. All those tiny nuts and bolts a child might swallow.
Of course, I had an Erector set, and my brother had a chemistry set, and we both survived.
I had an Erector Set as well. I’m still alive.
Lordy, it’s a miracle!!
It’s fair to say that nowadays, such toys would be an absolute impossibility, not just because of the CPSC, but because the moment little Jimmy burned himself, or blew up the garage or whatever, the parents would file a multi-million dollar lawsuit.
With regard to the Atomic Energy Set, can you imagine the hysteria the media would go into? “Oh my God! It’s the al-Qaeda junior jihadi atomic bomb toy!”
ATOMIC ENERGY SET: The original Atomic Energy set sold for $49.50 in 1950, the modern equivalent of $458.99, and came with four different kinds of uranium ore. It also included a Geiger counter, a government manual called Prospecting for Uranium and a comic book called Learn How Dagwood Splits the Atom ....
Blondie.... I split the atom...
I had the Erector set, Physics set, Chemistry set and Microscope. The microscope was rather mediocre but I loved the rest of them.