Boom!(Whoosh, sputter, pop, at least.)
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Pyrotechnic holdings in the Harvard theatre collection consist largely of books about chemistry (how to make a powder that burns with a strong green color, for instance) or books about performance (how to stage a dramatic show in this most ephemeral of the arts). Festival souvenirs of specific events suggest what was exploding at Versailles or some Florentine palace on such and such an occasion.
The whiz-bangs, crackers, pinwheels, flares, squibs, rockets, fizgigs, and other delights shown here are a compelling recent accession, snapped up by Frederic W. Wilson, curator of the Theatre Collection, when offered by a New York dealer whose ordinary line is rare books. But, says Wilson, the box of bombs, seemingly full of promise, is actually full of inoperable blanks.
The 125 combustive devices represented in this turn-of-the-century salesman's kit (or point-of-sale advertising display, perhaps) were manufactured by Wilder's World Renowned Fireworks, of Birmingham, England. The "Meteor Spray, Boy Scout Artillery, Incandescent Fountain, Mount Vesuvius, Guy Fawkes Bomb, Bengal Light, Crystal Comet, Torpedo Shell, Victoria Sprinkler, Prince of Wales' Feather" and other temptations ranged in price from a ha'penny to a shilling or more. The "Helter Skelter" came in two sizes, at tuppence or sixpence, and featured "hissing flying scorpions with flash and report."