RANDOM REMINDER

Press, Volume C, Issue 29523, 26 May 1961, Page 21

RANDOM REMINDER

Frenchmen were recently warned against the construction of their own rockets in their homes and gardens. The French Armed Forces have come to the conclusion that the making of propulsive devices by amateurs is a very dangerous procedure. Although. with typical Gallic courtesy, they admit to the fact that some youngsters have had brilliant success with launching small - scale rockets.

It is hardly a step from

here to the beginnings of amateur astronautics. Children will no doubt be tempted, when given a make-it-yourself space capsule for Christmas, to fire off their pets in their trial efforts, so that outer space will become thick with kittens, pups, lizards, snails and budgerigars, all whizzing about at frightening speed and making mockery of the nursery rhymes. Unfortunately, education has not kept pace with

science, and the prob-

ability is that even when children are given to hobbies of such an advanced nature, they will remain children. Which means that they will forever be running into trouble. But where, in grandfather’s day, a youngster might hide in the hen-house to evade parental wrath, in a few years’ time the father returning from work will discover another broken window, and the fact that his youngest son has just put himself into orbit.