Fellow Scout patch dealer Richard Shields, the Carolina Trader, sent me an e-mail that as he says, “is humorous if it wasn’t so serious.”

I received a call on Sun. night that I thought at first was a joke but
later found out the lady was dead serious.  Below is an article from a
Colorado paper in regards to the first aid kits.  The ones from Johnson
and Johnson made during the 1930-40s have gauze pads with an ointment on
them that crystallizes over time.  Those crystals are explosive.  The
lady from NC had her pads blown up after they evacuated her neighborhood
for four hours.  She said they made a pretty good pop. If you having
any, call your local authorities.

Checking an article from the Denver News they reported the following:

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — The Colorado Springs Police Department’s Hazardous Materials Team and Regional Explosives Unit was called out to a fire station Sunday because of concerns about the safety of a an antique Boy Scout first aid kit.The owner of the kit was concerned that kit may contain a small amount of picric acid and brought the kit to Fire Station 5 in Colorado Springs for disposal.The hazmat and explosives team remotely removed the hazard to a safe location and destroyed it, officials said.

Same Chemical Causes Other Evacuations

Picric acid was found in an antique Boy Scout first aid kit at the Pioneers Museum in Colorado Springs earlier this month. The museum was evacuated while the bomb squad and firefighters removed the material.

The same chemical was found in a historic doctor’s bag last month in a warehouse in the Lowry area of Denver belonging to the Colorado Historical Society, said society spokeswoman Rebecca Laurie.It too was picric acid, so the Denver bomb squad and a fire hazmat teams were called in to remove the acid.

“Sometimes, our researchers do come across chemicals in these kinds of medical hits or chemistry kits, things that were donated a long time ago,” said Laurie. “If they’re not sure what it is, they’re trained to call 911.

“Picric acid was stocked in pharmacies in the early 1920s as an antiseptic and as a treatment for burns, malaria, herpes and smallpox.