John Goschke

Seems to me this pretty much was their intention all along by buying up these alternative brands to lessen and eventually eliminate competition within the market. Within months after their purchase of Floquil they had changed the formula for "Old Silver" (which dried fast and hard) to something much more akin to the troublesome Testors silver enamels. PollyS for a long time now has been a shadow of what the range was formerly.

From a recent ebay auction. Early issue Revell kit with original box. From Gowland & Gowland molds. "Highway Pioneers: U.S. Classics Series." 1/32nd scale.

Yeah, that's pretty awful all right! Shame of it is that kit actually has a lot of potential in spite of its age. Looks way more like a Cord than does the 1/24 Pyro kit.

You've captured well the look of more than a few of the cars we would've seen cruising the Parkway in Levittown, PA in the mid-late '70s!

Almost without exception the 70s, particularly '72-'76, were really bad times for the US car industry. Bloated full-size cars, overweight intermediates, absurdly proportioned "personal luxury coupes" (Monte Carlo, GP, T-birds, Mark IV & V, etc. ad nauseum) cheap compacts with even more indifferent build quality than usual were the norm for the Big Three. Ridiculous styling cliches such as standup hood ornaments, opera windows and miniature carriage lights, half vinyl carriage roofs, cheap-looking fake woodgrain, cheap velour upholstery, cheap plastic trim, cheap vinyl stripe trim options and screaming chicken hood decals made every new model year a more depressing event than the one before. Coupled with the ridiculous gas mileage these vehicles typically achieved, the lack of long range durability they suffered, the outdated and unimaginative engineering and cynical product development they displayed, American cars of the period offered the fan of American cars virtually nothing to be proud of at the time.

GM, Chrysler, and Ford have spent over 30 years living down the reputation they made for themselves with the junk they built then and rightly so.

But who knows, maybe there is a market for a Revell 1/25 full detail kit of a Continental Mark V Bill Blass Edition or a Chrysler Cordoba with rich Corinthian Leather and fake wire wheel covers. Or maybe a '73 Buick Lesabre sedan molded in avocado green.

Sad years indeed.