The ACS Princeton LS and the Princeton University Chemistry Department held their sixth National Chemistry Week Open House at Frick Laboratory, Princeton University in Princeton, NJ, on October 21. Over 120 visitors ages 6 and up braved the weather to watch demonstrations and do activities related to the "Joy of Toys." (Some were veterans of more than one of our previous events.) Guests made a variety of materials, from bouncing balls, slime, and gak to putty, play dough and monster flesh. They also made bubble solution, doodled with magnets, exploded straws, examined love meters and fortune-telling fish, drew pictures with color-changing markers, and sculpted with magic sand. The toys available were as old as potato popguns and as new as thermochromic putty. Over 20 types of toys and toy-related activities were provided. A Marine honor guard was at the door to collect toys donated by guests to the Marine Toys for Tots Foundation.

This event would have been impossible without our 38 enthusiastic volunteers, many of whom were veterans of previous PLS National Chemistry Week events. This year’s volunteers included local section members, scientists from local industries, Princeton students and staff, and members of the community. Our two youngest volunteers were 12 years old, and our oldest was—well, we won’t tell, but he retired from a long career quite a few years ago!

Many thanks to Madelene, Sky, and Jenny Antane, for coming early to set up and then manning Gak and air rockets and exploding straws. Thanks to Bill Sachs for popping film canisters and to Frank Long for popping potatoes. Thanks to Bill Barnard, who worked magic with sand all night after spending all morning in a school with liquid nitrogen. Thanks to Thom Caggiano, who spent all night in a dark corner so that everyone could see things glow. Thanks to Louise Lawter for her efficiency with bubbles and her skills as a photographer. Thanks to Lynne Greenblatt for her tattoo artistry, her air rocketry and her dexterity with exploding straws. Thanks to Jerome Wu for experimenting with fortune fish and to Klaus Wagner for shrinking polymers. Thanks to Louise Vivona-Miller for supervising magnets and marbles, and to Brian Ventura and Jennifer for supervising color-changing markers. Thanks to Derk Huibers for his help with materials, and thanks to Steve Miller for recording it all for posterity.

Thanks to the Princeton students who donated time in the midst of exams. Ying Yu lent both her toaster oven and her polymer-baking skills. Youngjung Kim and Daniel Posen did a great job with hand boilers. Kavita Raghavan helped Bill with pop rockets. Chris Yee-Chan and Stephanie Malone braved Blaster Balls. Boris Russ, Tom Pickthorn, and Ron Weissbard supervised plastics and thermochromics.  Courtney Smith, Monica Saumoy, Yuna Larrabee, Dave Rosen, and Carmen Drahl supervised materials manufacture. Michael Constantinides and Carol Yan volunteered for magic and then appeared where needed. Annie Liu helped to set up, and Sobenna George and Xiaojing Huang helped to clean up. Very special thanks to Alistair Martin and Sally Rodriguez who were there from before the beginning till long after the end doing the least glamorous and most necessary jobs. Very, very special thanks to Ginny Sari for allowing us to invade her space in the middle of classes and for being such a good sport about it. (Gak may still be oozing out of the light fixtures!) Without Ginny, this event would be impossible.