What was your first plastic kit?

[toxicpixie]

I'm not sure... I know I must have some when living ooop north as I recall the covering the Airfix Pontoon bridge bag in the newsagents at the top of Shear Brow (not Hole-in-the-Wall, past the technical college). Bonus non-point if anyone can tell where that is without google But I cant recall what.

When we moved to the benighted south (West Midlands) I'm sure I had in fairly short order a Tiger, the kubelwagon & Sdkfz222 set, a Sherman and a Churchill. They all got kit bashed, because I was cr*p at assembly and easily distracted

I rapidly changed tack to using my Airfix commandos & paras to seize my model railway trains which were run by evil Nazis who tended to get their just desserts by then being dumped on the track and run over

[Raider4]

I rapidly changed tack to using my Airfix commandos & paras to seize my model railway trains which were run by evil Nazis who tended to get their just desserts by then being dumped on the track and run over

Hmm, not quite in the spirit of the Geneva Convention. Remember, we're the good guys in this one.

[toxicpixie]

"Youthful high spirits"

[FierceKitty]

Come, come. Don't put yourself down so.

Momentary aberration. Thank you for the words of comfort.

[Terry37]

Oh my, that was far too many years ago to even remember. I started modeling in the early 50's and at that time there were only balsa and tissue,  and a few solid wood kits. I think my first one was a solid wood F-86 and made by Stormbecker?   The various parts were roughly shaped and you had to sand them down to the proper shape.  My father, pilot,  was stationed at Clark AFB during the Korean Conflict and that was the type of models I was able to get at the time. I didn't see a plastic model until we returned to the States after the conflict was over - and the first plastic model I saw was an Aurora B-25! Wow! What memories!!!!







A bit of trivia for you - my fathers bomber, B-25, from WW2 is on he cover of one book, in numerous other books and the box art on 4 different model kits.

http://www.ww2wings.com/wings/heroes/allanwebb/allanwebb.shtml

Terry

[paulr]

Good to see that 13 was lucky for your father

Interesting to see the Crew Chief's name on the aircraft as well as the Commander's

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Wow, cool page.

[Terry37]

I had wanted to write a book about my father's plane, with the title - "Peggy Lou and the Men Who Flew Her". I found and wrote to many of the men, but except for Fred Lawrence, the crew chief, I was not able to really get very much information. I have pictures of the plane from the day it arrived on the Squadron to the day it crashed, including the crash report. Ended up that I didn't feel I had enough material to achieve what I really wanted so dropped the idea. It's a funny story why the number 13 was put on his plane. Long story short, the ground officer had it in for Fred, so did that to spite him. backfired, as it turned out to be a lucky number!!!

Another piece of trivia, of all the art renderings of the plane not one of them has ever depicted the plane correctly!!! One book even lists the pilot as a fellow that was never in the 445th BS!!! She had four pilots assigned as aircraft commander during eh war, My father was the third.

Here's another piece of trivia. The nose art was a nude girl, but Fred did not want his plane flying around with a nude girl on it, so he painted the outline of an umbrella over most of her!!!!

Terry

[Westmarcher]

Great story, Terry. 

[FierceKitty]

What was wrong with this aerial eunuch?

[Terry37]

FierceKitty, if you are referring to the ground officer, the story is this. He thought Fred, dad's crew chief, had written a letter to higher ups about him, which evidently caused him some issue? Truth be told, the ground officer and Fred had a chat at wars end, and when confronted with the accusation Fred told him he'd never written any such letter, and wherever he got that idea it was quite wrong. Of course by then all the damage had been done....except that although Fred had the points to go home, the ground officer had already processed the papers to have Fred assigned to one of the P-61 squadons! So, Fred ended up serving from Operation Torch until after May 8th, 1945. He served in Africa, Corsica, and Italy. Fred lived up into his 80's and was very active in the Bomb Wing reunions up until the very last one.

I have many stories as I attended several of the reunions and got to know the men who served with my father, and they were always happy to share stories with me. Until the day my father died, he never talked much about the war, as it always bothered him that he had dropped bombs killing people.


Early in Peggy Lou's history. Fred is left, talking to Mal Rygh, the first pilot and the one who named her. he named her after his girl back home, but ended up not marrying her after the war. I would need to look up the name of the asst. crew chief on the ladder, but he is painting another bomb for a mission on the nose. Note that only the name appears on the starboard side, and not the nose art, which was only on the port side.


Here she is a Wright-Pat after the war shortly before she crashed. The crash should never have happened and was due to pilot error. A Major and a Lieutenant were flying her around the base to get in their flight time one evening in September when a sudden thunder storm came up. They were ordered to land, which was fine. The error was that although both pilots were IFR trained, they kept flying using VFR and flew her into the ground! Fortunately the plane did not catch fire, but broke into many, many pieces. The only way to know which plane it was from the photos of the crash is because part of the fuselage with the serial was intact.


Peggy Lou on a mission. Would have to look up 09 to tell you who she is.


This is the most used picture of her. Dropping frag bombs on German AA batteries. A lead section would fly ahead of the main group to do this to hopefully lessen the amount of FLAK. The plane on her starboard is 02, Pistol Pack'n Mama, Dan Bowling's plane, but on this mission was being flown by Norm Doe.


My father's final resting place, with my son and granddaughter. He was buried with full military honors.

Sorry, did not mean to hijack the thread.

Terry

[FierceKitty]

I was referring to the one who appeared to dislike the female form.

[Steve J]

Fascinating reading Terry and great you have been able to find out so much information.

[Ithoriel]

Sorry, did not mean to hijack the thread.

Wouldn't count that as a hijack. Fascinating stuff.

[paulr]

I was referring to the one who appeared to dislike the female form.

Different times, different norms FK It was probably also about where the form was...

Wouldn't count that as a hijack. Fascinating stuff.

Seconded, good to hear that you have it all written down, too many of these stories get lost over time

Also great to see your granddaughter is following in your father's footsteps