not saying he did or did not have or make such a thing , but he would not be the first to have done this in america David Charles Hahn . Not the brightest eagle scout , but he built a working nuclear reactor in his mothers shed and it spewed radiation for months lol . maybe he just wandered what it felt like to glow in the dark .
Wow! What a kid!
“David Charles Hahn (October 30, 1976 – September 27, 2016) sometimes called the "Radioactive Boy Scout" or the "Nuclear Boy Scout", was an American who attempted to build a homemade neutron source at the age of 17.”
“He later received a merit badge in Atomic Energy and became fascinated with the idea of creating a breeder reactor in his home. Hahn diligently amassed radioactive material by collecting small amounts from household products, such as americium from smoke detectors, thorium from camping lantern mantles, radium from clocks, and tritium from gunsights. His "reactor" was a bored-out block of lead, and he used lithium from $1,000 worth of purchased batteries to purify the thorium ash using a Bunsen burner”
“His homemade neutron source was often incorrectly referred to as a reactor, but it did end up emitting dangerous levels of radiation, likely well over 1,000 times normal background radiation“
“On September 27, 2016, at the age of 39,Hahn died in his hometown of Shelby Charter Township, Michigan. His death was accidental and due to intoxication from the combined effects of alcohol, diphenhydramine, and fentanyl.”
“The incident received scant media attention at the time, but was widely disseminated after writer Ken Silverstein published an article about the incident in Harper's Magazine in 1998. In 2004 he expanded it into a book, The Radioactive Boy Scout, which was optioned for a feature film in 2016.”
en.wikipedia.org