Toy vendor scores hit with marshmallow gun

The toy comes with a starter bag of marshmallows.
By STEPHEN SIFF
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
BAZETTA -- It can hurtle marshmallows across the midway with a single puff. Irritate strangers from across a field. And turn 13-year-old boys green with envy.
Hide your chocolate and graham crackers: The toy gun of the future is here.
The marshmallow gun, a blowgunlike contraption of PVC pipes and fittings, has been making hits all over the Trumbull County Fair, which opened Monday and continues through Sunday.
"Ohhh, a marshmallow gun," said Jon Clark, 13, of Cortland, after being beaned by a flying mini-marshmallow from a vendor wedged between a tent selling new windows and a ball-toss game. He and a friend immediately ran over to take a look.
"They are one of the most popular toys on the midway," said the vendor, Tony Lee, of D & amp;K Novelty, who sold the blowguns by force of mouth, shooting the soft candies at passing fair-goers.
Made by employees
The gun, constructed by D & amp;K employees in Ashtabula during slow days at the office, was the only item amid the booths' plastic beads, cap guns and toy cigarettes not made in China.
D & amp;K started making the guns after seeing them at other fairs, Lee said.
"I saw the marshmallow gun and I'm angry I didn't invent the marshmallow gun," said county board of elections deputy director Rokey W. Suleman II, who was manning a tent a few booths away. "They're selling 50 cents worth of plastic with a sloppy spray paint job for $6."
That would be 50 cents worth of plastic capable of shooting a mini-marshmallow 30 feet. And the $6 includes a starter bag of marshmallows, to get you through the fair.
The adolescent boys who bought them Tuesday seemed to feel as though they got their money's worth, popping off shots as they wove through the crowd around the Bicentennial Stage. Rick Foerster, who bought one for his 8-year-old daughter at another fair, says it wasn't a bad investment.
"It is still a good toy a year later," he said.