Revell model history

[Vietnam Vet67]

Saw this on the Hemmings site so I thought I would post it.

 

Revell Models from Hemmings Classic Car

March, 2017 - Jeff Koch

 

When we were too young to drive, and car magazines weren't enough to sate our automotive hunger, who among us failed to delve into the technical wonder of a Revell model kit? The labyrinthine array of parts... They couldn't possibly all go together and make a car, could they? With patience, they could and did. With practice, paint techniques improved, or fewer glue spots appeared on the windshield, or you discovered materials that could work as detailing (flocking for interiors? Sewing thread for spark plug wires?). More than a few hands-on mechanics and car fans got their mechanical interests fired up with a tube of glue, a paint brush and some imagination.

 

Revell is one of the great names in model car kits. The company started as Precision Specialties, a plastics-molding company in Hollywood, California, during WWII. As a vendor, Precision Specialties worked with a variety of clients, but it struck out on its own with a line of HO-scale trains and set decorations. By 1950 it was making a couple of 1⁄16-scale cars, including a Model T Ford and a 1911 Maxwell, with tooling from Gowland and Gowland of England. The old-timers had not fared well overseas but did rather better stateside, partly on the back of Jack Benny's famed Maxwell in his TV program. The burgeoning toy division of the company soon adopted the name Revell--said to come from the French word reveille, meaning "wake up," "new beginning," or "pay attention," depending on your translator. It's also a bugle call associated with waking military personnel and prisoners alike from their slumber; this seems apt, considering what was to come.

Edited February 10, 2017 by Vietnam Vet67

[disabled modeler]

Now that is a survivor kit from the past...even the box looks close to mint.   Its nice to see the old ones that are out there somewhere hiding.  

[Edsel-Dan]

I looked at a March issue of M

Hemmings Motor News a few days ago

But All I saw on Collectibles was a Marx 'Electric' Slot car set Not a Revell history

So was it in the March issue, Or Feb, or even Jan??

 

Or was it a DIFFERENT Hemmings Magazine??

Edited February 17, 2017 by Edsel-Dan

[Chuckyg1]

It's the March issue of Hemming's Classic Cars. There's also a small article on TV show cars, as well as an article in early race car aerodynamics, I believe 1917 or there about. It's a really good issue, check it out if you can.