RSSI’m a 62-year-old woman and I built Heathkits. Learned how to read a simple circuit diagram at a very young age. And still can. We also had those great sets with the molds and the goop that you cooked over a little hot plate… Creepy Crawlers might’ve been one of them. But there were monster sets and other sets. Some of the rubber pieces had tabs and slots that fit together after they were peeled from the molds. My Dad used the Creepy Crawlers to make fishing lures. We also had a chemistry set and microscope and Erector set.
My brothers had air pistols, and one of my brothers was always blowing things up. I think maybe there was a way of filling the air pistol cartridge with a pile of wooden match heads and turning it into a little explosive device? Anyway, he’d build a model and within a day or two, blow it up! Go-carts… My younger brother built one, took it for a ride, and then promptly sold it to another kid. And we rode our bikes all over the place. Came home with frogs and tadpoles from a nearby pond. Played in empty building lots. My Mom never worried about where we went or what we were doing.
The only thing that caused a whole lot of screaming and yelling was if my younger brother dragged a pile of tools from the basement and out onto the driveway to work on some project outside, and then left the tools sitting in the driveway…and it started to rain. Oh, God! I, however knew better. I hated hearing my Dad yell. But, there could never be too much WD-40!