The Little World

I’m old.

I can remember plastic-bagged 50¢ Airfix kits. I can remember the little brown vials of cement that came in the boxed kits. ( best cement ever…) I can remember life before acrylic paints…

Old.

But this doesn’t mean to say that I am feeble-minded – or that I can be persuaded to open my wallet to all comers. You see, I remember the days when a model kit contained everything you needed for that specific build. Not the paint, mind, nor the scalpel blade to remove the excess plastic and/or a fingertip. But every part that the manufacturer thought necessary for you to have a completed model of an LST, or a Triumph TR3, or an F-94. Once you glued it all together, painted it and strung it fron the ceiling light fixture, it was a real finished model.

You were not required, encouraged, cozened, or conned into buying photo-etched sheets, vacuum-formed accessories, resin parts, or extra decals. It was no shame to use up all the bits in the kit and leave it at that. If you were able to do so without leaving visible fingerprints on the canopy, you could consider yourself an expert.

No longer. My friend Warren has pointed out that the price of the after-market accessory packs can be more than the price of the kit itself. I believe him. And I do not know whether to applaud or boo. Part of me wants to see the hobby expand further and further and part of me is overwhelmed.

Of course, the dedicated, detailed, and desperate will aim to produce a model of a particular prototype at a particular time and will move Heaven and Earth to get the last bit of information needed to do it. They search the internet, libraries, serial numbers, forums, books, survivors and the entrails of sacred geese to find out if the seatbelts of the Pakschrowskiovich RRH67/0ww were folded to the right or the left on April 6th, 1953. This can be depressing to all the rest of the world until you get to observe two enthusiasts at this level fighting out the question. Then it is fun to watch. I like to bring popcorn and a big orange drink.

I want to go the other way. I do not go as far as generic modelling, but I do like the general stuff. I do not quail at serial numbers and unit markings being slightly off-station, as long as they look right. The diehard contest experts might squirm at this, but then they squirm at anything that does not run in their own narrow channel. You have only to paint a Messerschmitt 109 in candy apple red and they are disabled for a week. Yet that is just how Aurora moulded ’em in the 50’s.

Nostalgia is a cruel and dangerous weapon…