[WWI] Properly Introducing Myself

Thu May 1 11:11:50 EDT 2008

Hello all,
    I have been posting questions of a wildly varying nature for the past several months and I thought it was high time I properly introduced myself to the readership. Beware, however, for I am long winded.

    But first, I cannot introduce myself without first introducing my dad, Capt. W.E. Scarborough, USN (ret.); Navy pilot, aerohistorian, and model builder.

    On Christmas day, 1919, at the age of three, my father fell out of a second floor window. The doctor pronounced him fit as a fiddle and went on to predict, "he must gonna be an aviator". Doc had no idea how his prediction would come true.
    
    Inspired by stories of Great War air battles and The Red Baron, my dad began building models back in the late 1920s carving them from fruit crates. He did well with it and his first flight in a real airplane, an Eastern Air Transport Curtiss Condor, was the result of winning first place in a competition for a model he had made of a Boeing F4B-4. Only in his dreams would it have occurred to him that he would be flying real F4B-4s in enlisted pilot training at Pensacola just a few years later. 

     
    During my teen years, when my dad began doing a lot of writing, there was no telling who might be on the other end of the phone when it rang: Bill Larkins, Dave Lucabaugh, Pete Grozs, Bob Mikesh, Fred Dickie, Leo Opdyke and, in later years, Barrett Tillmann and the late Jeff Ethell were all regular correspondents. Dad was primarily a source of research and information for writers like these but he also wrote numerous articles as well as the Squadron/Signal books on the PBY, PV Ventura, and F7F, all planes he had put many hours in. My dad led the teams for, and I was also fortunate enough to take part in, the restoration of the Wildcat at the Smithsonian NASM, the FF-1 at the Naval Air Museum at Pensacola, and our own Fairchild F-24. But it was always WWI planes he loved best and at one point we began construction of a full scale Fokker Triplane. He passed that love on to me and at one point in the 60s I had built every 1/72 WWI model then available. My specialty, of course, was the Fokker Triplane, done in the requisite Testors Gloss Red. I can smell it now.


    It was a heady atmosphere in which to build models, and I did my best, always under my dad's watchful and very critical eye, to do what I could at accurizing and detailing the kits of the era. Unfortunately, youthful impatience and inherited self-criticism led to burn out. When I went off to college, no models went with me. Besides, styrene could hardly have competed with sorority coeds.


    I have built a few models in the years since but never with the same sort of enthusiasm I had as a kid. I then met Mike Good at a miniature figures show and he said that if I wanted to see really FINE model building I should visit the WWI models site. In order to familiarize myself with current techniques and materials, he also sent me to Gregg Cooper's series of articles on Hyperscale about his OOB build of the Tamiya Gekko. I followed his advice and had never had more fun building a model.


    Then, last November, again at a miniature figures show, I had the pleasure of meeting Andrei Koribanics whose models and figures I have admired and studied since 1978. Andrei was displaying a 1/72 Sparrow Scout and I was stunned at the level of artistry and craftsmanship in it. We began trading emails and he too sent me to the WWI Models website. I have been here daily since November but I must seem totally schizophrenic in my WWI interests.


    Allow me to explain: it seemed that a logical way for me to get seriously back into WWI model building was to rebuild a wrecked Revell 1/28 Triplane I had built for my dad in 1972. (It was done in Voss, not Gloss, thank God.) I was, however, quickly lured into the Roden 1/32 Triplane. I work as a furniture designer/maker and a decorative artist and things Viennese are a passion of mine, as is also figure painting, so, I determined that my Triplane would have an Austro-Hungarian pilot...hence, my next bunch of postings; questions about A-H pilots' uniforms. I then felt, that due to the level of detail that 1/32 required I was rushing things and decided to go with something (I thought) more straight forward and opted for the Eduard 1/48 MoS. N. But, there was no PE in my kit so I ordered a fret from Eduard. I had to build something while I waited for the fret to arrive and this led to the Eduard W.4. Well, I just had to get the simulated plywood sides accurate so this led to those postings and my cyber meeting with Tom Morgan. I quickly found out that the Eduard Kriegsmarine lozenge was suspect so lozenge postings followed and that led Andrei to casually mention that there had been a lozenge done for the H-B W.20. I was unfamiliar with the plane but one look made me fall in love. Hence all the postings about the W.20 and then the discovery that it was intended for use on U-Boats, and the possibility of a diorama with figures, led to more questions re: W.20 kits. Ergo, between the W.4 and the H-B W.20 I have now fallen in love with Kriegsmarine aircraft and the idea of a "collection" of them in 1/72 is now germinating in my already over worked brain. As Tom Morgan has pointed out on numerous occasions, I lack focus. I counter this with the idea that I just have varied interests......I just wish they'd vary at a slower rate.


    Well, I am well into the W.4 build now and last night had my first true WWI model building experience; attempting to attach the floats to the fuselage. All I could think of was a baby giraffe trying to walk for the first time, legs going in every direction at once. This analogy quite tickled Dr. Morgan who said, "now you know why you see so few WWI models at competitions." Amen, Doc. He then proceeded to introduce me to  a whole new subject: JIGS.


    So, dear readers, if you have had the fortitude to read this far you will now understand the broad range of my inquiries on the site. I will finish off the W.4, then go back to the MoS N. In the meantime I will start gathering materials and info for the following build, the Eduard Nieuport 11. I also plan to start gathering kits for the 1/72 Kriegsmarine collection. Better to go ahead and get them in the stash, I say. Oh yes, there's also the 1/48 collection of Udet's planes featuring the LO! marking. Hey, if it crosses my mind, I will post and ask, then file the answer for future reference. But, I am really trying to only BUILD ONE AT A TIME.


    Glad to be here,

    Michael


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