This group build brings me back to modelling after 20 odd years and back to my roots of how I got started.
I can't even remember why I went into a hobby shop in my hometown called The Hobby Emporium. A small shop in a converted house in my hometown run by a kind old man named Pete. I don't remember what led me to buying my first kit but he encouraged me and I bought a Monogram F-4 Phantom II. The classic kit in this box...
I eagerly glued it together, painted the cockpit silver and tan camouflage on the bare green plastic. It, of course, looked nothing like the picture on the box. I showed it to Pete and he took me to his bench and started to show me how to improve it. He taught me to sand the seams with steel wool and paint different areas and how to apply decals. I remember he was working on the, then new and amazing, Testor's F-19 Stealth Fighter and his black model looked amazing. I wanted to build models that looked like that! That first Phantom, my first model, would up in a toy box in my parents place and it got dug out a few years ago. I remember those days going into Pete's shop and working on models on his bench. I remember having my bike stolen off the pole, lock and all, from the front of his shop after spending a summer day there.
But it was a formative experience. Pete was probably in his 60s back then and the shop and he are long gone. But those memories and that classic kit linger on to this day and I thank him for teaching me those first skills that let me build much better models through most of my teens and early adulthood.
Despite having lapsed for years my stash has a number of these old Monogram Phantoms in storage.
So in honor of Pete and my entry into the hobby, I will crack open this oldie but goodie (and cheap even today!) F-4 Phantom II and build it up a lot better out-of-the-box than I ever did when I was 8!
Matt