To me, a thread going south means fights are started and insults flung. This has just been, as George put it, thread drift and that's to be expected. Dan, I know what you mean by that replacement Testors glue. it was in a white and orange tube and smelled like oranges. It wouldn't stick to itself, let alone any styrene. I think my tube of it is still stashed someplace. My friend's sister Marcia (man, she was pretty) back in 1968-69 was dating a guy who worked at the local Ben Franklin or Coast-To-Coast store and sold some kid a tube of regular Testors. The kid sniffed it, jumped off a bridge into the freezing cold river and drowned. His parents sued the store and Marcia's boyfriend and they charged her boyfriend with a crime but he was found innocent. I believe they are still married to this day. I think all you had to do was BUY a tube of Testors and a glue fingerprint would appear on model windows. Doug
YES, that was it alright. You have a good memory, orange scented it was. Lloyd Bridges even worked a gag with the fad in the movie Airplane!
And there was a time when you could have bought that model glue at a department store... whether it was the wrong week to stop sniffing it or not. (Trying once again to get back on topic... )
Oh my gosh, I think a tube of the safe-but-worthless glue appears in an old family slide from my 1970 birthday with me building an N Scale kit. I've enlarged a portion of it here. The tube sure looks orange and white. Note that my work mat is a Sears ad.
I was on a FB Group this morning, which is about a town where I once lived, (youth days), and where my father had his business. Someone posted a photo which jogged my memory. About a block from Dad's store, was a large drug store, which previously had a bowling alley in the basement. After the alley was closed, they had an area down there set up with toys. And trains. Where I bought assorted Lionel and American Flyer items. How did I ever forget that? Yikes. Getting old-er-ish, I guess....
Oh, oh. Now that I see that photo, maybe it's a white and BLUE tube, not orange. Now I'm not sure which. Doug Ah, the Atlas Factory (which I'm sure was sold in some department stores ). That's about the same time I built mine and here it is on my current layout: It looks white but the paint is only in the mortar lines but the mortar lines are so wide, it makes the walls look white in the picture. Doug
I do remember the Testor's glue. The blue stuff was the useless stuff. And I remember buying HO scale Tyco and Mantua stuff at Kmart, Zayre's and Kresge.
Oh my, I recognize a bunch of those structures. The Delrey Foundry seen at left in your photo was pre-built I recall; I had it too, seen below. Ha ha - I look at this picture and see what a mess of a layout I had as a kid! I must have used 500 LBS of plaster on that mountain.
Yes, the Delrey Foundry was initially a pre-built structure... sold under the Revell (!) brand. It had the "Alaska Adventure!" billboard when they marketed it. Later, it was offered under other brands as what I would call a "sort of" kit-- the shell of the factory in one piece including the roof to which the assembler added windows and details.
I have to say, this is probably the best thread I have seen in a very long time. It’s great to take a stroll down memory lane and hear everyone’s own stories. Good show!
late to the party on this one but growing up in a really small town, one of the biggest events of the year was getting all dressed up and driving an hour+ away to go see the "Christmas Window" at the Lazarus in downtown Columbus, OH. It was bright, and shiny, and lots of moving parts - and always included trains. This was back in the 70s, but no joke - there was always crowd, people taking photos with their families, etc. I can't remember a single time we ever even went inside lol but for a 5yr old it was amazing. We'd start asking about it as soon as Thanksgiving was over!
Suitably commemorated in the film A Christmas Story! Of course, Ralphie focused on the Red Ryder BB Gun while most others looked at the trains. Macy's "Toyland" in the flagship 34th Street store in Manhattan was usually good for a display of trains during Christmastime. I don't recall them having that many actual trains for sale, though.
Hi George, One of my fond memories as a kid was our visits to the Buhl Planetarium miniature railroad & village during Christmas. https://www.heinzhistorycenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Buhl-04_buhl0001.jpg It was a Lionel layout the filled most of the lobby at the Buhl Planetarium. Now the Buhl Planetarium has been moved to the Carnegie Science center and the Miniature Railroad & Village has it's own devoted room for the Lionel layout. Plus now it's open year round except for maintenance and upgrades in August.
We mentioned the Testors Non-Toxic Plastic Cement, No. 3522. Today, I was looking through a box for something else and there mine was. Still fluid and still smells like oranges after about fifty years! Yup, blue and white tube. The orange and white tube was the full-strength stuff. Doug
Doug, I think I still have a tube left over from my son's model building days. The only redeeming thing that glue had was that if you screwed up putting something together, you could easily break it apart and reattach it without too much effort. Ralph
On the back are the instructions which state to apply to both surfaces and hold together for 20 seconds and allow 4 HOURS drying time! Yeah right, like the pieces are going to stick together after only 20 seconds and like I was going to wait 4 hours until the next step! It was at this time I started using Testors liquid cement for styrene that came in the square, glass bottle (the same kind of bottle that was in Gilbert Chemistry sets) and I discovered how much better it was for assembling models than the tube stuff. For faster drying time, they point to Testors No. 3501 Cement For Plastic Models which I bet is what shows in Dan's picture of him building the Atlas Factory. Doug
Even when sitting outside on the back porch putting buildings together, that stuff gave me a headache... Also, for some reason I got really hungry after that... I'll leave it to someone else to dredge up the Lloyd Bridges meme from Airplane... you know the one...
When I reach the stage of buying structures for my new N Scale layout, I'll likely be shocked at current prices. I did save most of my old structures though, so maybe that will help. I also scratchbuilt a number of buildings because nobody made what I wanted and that was fun. Thankfully I see that N Scale doors and windows are made.
