Is 6,500 Kits Too Many?

[spotmodel]

Esto lo he leido por ahi y ...

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When his garage door swung open, my mouth did likewise. Wow...this is my first experience with a true "Hordasaurus". Floor to ceiling, wall to wall model kits. Overwhelmingly aircraft, but cars, sci-fi, ships and armour where scattered throughout. My eyes scan in fits and starts as they fall upon a thousand kits from yesteryear. Kits that my older brother had built as a kid. Kits my dad would have built as my mom put the first diaper on me.

"Some of these haven't seen the light of day for 20 years." he says. I knew alot of these kits were at least twenty years old, but untouched for 20 years? The late '70s were not a great time for modelers, and it was about that time that I fell away from the hobby. These kits represent the time I missed. They are New-Old Stock. Each wrapped and tagged at unheard of sub-two dollar prices from places that no longer exist.

It was too much to take. I mumble to myself: "I remember that one...", "That was the first model I ever built, or was it that one...", "I don't believe this...". At last count he mentioned that the collection numbered near 6500 kits, each purchased individually through a retail outlet. Some have been built and sold over the years but most are still here, in storage. There are several duplications in this collection with one design in particular repeated over 100 times. It is a daunting and varied assemblage none the less.

Upon closer scrutiny some of the kit boxes show the strain of years of compression as more and more kits were piled upon them. An original issue Monogram C-47 Sky Train is stratling a beam, squashed nearly in half under the weight of the numerous kits atop it. Several other kits have water stained boxes, hinting at a horrible fate for the kit within. Others are so dusty that model and maker are totally obscured. The cellophane, covering an Entex Super Guppy, has changed molecular structure and turned to powder when touched. Nonetheless a wealth of prime styrene lay in front of me...what an opportunity for a reborn modeler.

In a large cardboard box along the back wall, beneath the bag from a forgotten lawnmower, hid a wonderful collection of sealed car kits. An AMT Edsel Funny Car, AMT 70 Monte Carlo, AMT Allison Thunderland, Jo-Han Maverick Funny Car, Aurora Hearse with a Curse, and oh, so many more...

I was struck by the incredible need to own all of these kits. Many of these had been re-issued, their beautiful box art replaced by a builtup. No thanks! There will never be a model equal to the box art of the golden age.

So as I gazed into this plastic wall of voodoo, I felt the heat from my wallet warming the hobby center of my heart. OK...I'll take this one, and this, and this one...I realized too late that he had just passed the "Collectors Gene" on to me.

I'm told, short of a house fire, there is no cure.

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Lastima que no haya fotos porque seria realmente espectacular.

[hoellemeister]

Pues ya puede ir empezando a montar...... Por cierto, en pintura se le va a ir un pico.