The appeal of one strange object, which achieved dizzying popularity in my lifetime, and today lives on mostly for nostalgia, is not so difficult to explain. All you need to do is turn one on and wait.
Solenopsis invicta, the “Red Imported Fire Ant”, native to South America, has proven a tenacious and destructive pest in the United States, costing Americans billions of dollars every year. That is why, in the late 1950s, the United States embarked on an all out war against the six-legged menace.