The 1967 edition of Science & Mechanics Annual, entitled the Science Experimenter, contains detailed assembly instruction for building your own miniature Tesla coil. In spite of its diminutive size the project nonetheless is still capable of producing 60,000 volts of power at 500,000 cycles per second, and all entirely harmless.
Author Harold P. Strand explains how, in spite of the extreme levels of current produced, because of its high frequency the output of voltage travels over any conductive surface. This applies also to the body's skin and ensures that the current flows to a suitable ground source while at the same time avoiding injury or even death.
When the Science Experimenter was issued, some 33 years ago, it was possible in those days to purchase an assembled Tesla-coil model directly from Edmund Scientific, of Barrington, NJ. They offered a 15,000 volt model (Cat. #70,301) for $44 ppd. It came with an instruction book featuring 21 experiments.
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