The world’s most dangerous toy has been offered up for auction which includes a radioactive atomic energy kit with real uranium in time for Christmas.
The Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Laboratory toy was made available to kids from the early 1950s back when atomic bombs were relatively new.
It was marketed as an educational toy for budding child scientists.
The radioactive atomic energy lab kit complete with real uranium is hitting the auction block.
The toy lab kit was created by Alfred Carlton Gilbert.
RR Auction says fewer than 5,000 Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Laboratories were ever made making it a rare find.
The toy was discontinued in 1950, with Gilbert’s company blaming “government restrictions” and the “difficulty of obtaining materials.” The toy has real uranium.
The lab kit includes a cloud chamber for viewing alpha particles, a spinthariscope to observe radioactive disintegration and an electroscope to measure radiation levels in the four included substances.
The kit also has some extras including a U.S. government guide to uranium prospecting. It comes in a custom metal case.
The uranium samples are still radioactive and will be for 4.5 billion years.
A 2020 analysis by IEEE Spectrum, the world’s leading engineering magazine, says the radiation is equivalent to UV exposure from the sun as long as the samples remain in the sealed containers.
The $49.50 set came with four samples of uranium-bearing ores, autunite, torbernite, uraninite, and carnotite, as well as a Geiger-Müller radiation counter and various other tools.
The set also came with a comic book featuring Dagwood from the popular Blondie comic strip. It was titled “Learn How Dagwood Splits the Atom” and written in conjunction with General Leslie Groves, director of the Manhattan Project.
Bidding on the Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Laboratory ends Dec. 11, meaning someone could have a very unusual Christmas present.
For any children raised in the ’50s who got a Gilbert Atomic Energy Lab for Christmas, they are advised not to hand this gift down to their grandkids. The half-life of uranium is 4.5 billion years, or the age of the solar system. The radioactive ore is still radioactive.
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