Classic old hobbyshops
Bill:
As we've talked about; the best memories of the mid-fifties was to
go into the old hobby shops, make two laps of the store looking at the 30 or 40 planes hanging from the ceiling. Row after row of Comet, Veco and Jetco kits. Along the topshelf were those big RC kits in the $20 to $30.00 range that were so far out of my price budget. Then after checking out each plane box, it was on to the 100 or so .69 cent AMT/Revell car and truck kits.
The downward slide of the full stocked hobby shop was about
1960 when the slot cars gained so much popularity. The store
owners had to go with the flow and put in a 4 lane race track or a
drag strip. Racks of kits had to give way to the tracks. I never got into the slots, but I did assemble a division of the little 2", 3"
tanks, artillary and infantry that Patton and Rommel would be
proud to command. Many summer hours were spent at a local
dirt pile setting up the armour and infantry for battle and taking
turns tossing pellets trying to knock-out the tanks and kill radius
on the men. I must have logged a hundred miles on my bike going
to Paffenfuss Hardware/Hobbies to add a couple of Tiger or
Sherman tanks to my collection each week.
Randy