'49 Olds

[bob paeth]

In his latest posting, Jason Rothgeb mentioned the '49 Olds that never was. Stand by for " The Rest of the Story" ( forgive me Paul Harvey ).

Back in ( about ) 1966 I proposed to management of Revell, a '49 Olds coupe. The "bean counters" thought it was a good idea and gave me the go-ahead to start development of the kit. Now, you must understand that in the model industry spying and trying to find out what your competitors are doing is a way of life. I would trade bits of information about Revell for other bits of info from say AMT or Monogram. I always tried to get more than I gave with relative success. To make a long story short, I learned that Monogram was working on an Olds also. In that era, manufacturers had the belief that the market would only support one model of any given 1/1 car. I had no choice but to cancell the Olds kit.

Now, flash forward a coupla years and find your self at a GSLIMCC award brunch. Bob Johnson, then head of Monogram was the keynote speaker. I asked him what became of the Olds project at Monogram. There had been more than enough time to produce it. He stated that when he learned, through his "spy network" that Revell was gonna do the kit, he cancelled his efforts.

As they say, the rest is history.Neither company produced the '49 Olds kit and our hobby missed out on a great choice of a kit.

Bob :shock:

[62rebel]

BOB, that's a classic case of "oops" on both parties! i imagine lots of promised kits never saw light due to that!

[ratrodder]

:roll: What a bummer! Now start again. ratrodder

[Steve H.]

Kinda like "Spy vs. Spy"... neither of them ever won, either!

[ismaelg]

I wonder if a '57 Chevy convertible had the same fate. It was a logical, but never released AFAIK

[Casey]

I'm going to guess this wasn't the only time this has happened, but it was nice to hear/read it from a direct source.

[Deano]

Is there a reason you're reviving 8 year-old zombie threads? I mean, they're kinda interesting but they've been deceased for 8 years.

[Casey]

Is there a reason you're reviving 8 year-old zombie threads? I mean, they're kinda interesting but they've been deceased for 8 years.

I think it's an interesting story, and I thought others might enjoy reading it, too. Not everyone reads through older posts nor was a member of this forum when it was first created in 2006, and if not, they may have no idea Bob's post and info ever existed. Maybe you and others feel posts and the information contained within them are irrelevant after a certain period of time, but I appreciate the history of the hobby, especially when that history is told by someone who actually worked for Revell.

[1930fordpickup]

I agree with Casey . It is a good read.

[karbuildr]

I love these stories about the "old" days of our hobby. Fascinating reading, thanks for sharing.

[southpier]

I miss Bob Paeth.

even when he was slowing down, he's always bring something of interest into the conversation.

[tim boyd]

This topic was covered in a kit review of the Revell '50 Olds in the other magazine not long ago, but not nearly in the detail of Bob's post above.

I think Bob's recollection of the timing may have been a bit off....by 1966 Monogram was starting to enter into its "thingie" and Tom Daniel kit phases; I think a more logical time frame from both Monogram and Revell perspective might have been 1964 or 1965 (perhaps right before or after both companies introduced their 1955 Chevy Bel Air kits in 1963 and 1965, respectively). Regretably, as we all know, Bob Paeth passed away a number of years ago, so we can't revisit the subject with him now.

And for some reason I was under the impression that Bob Johnson didn't join Monogram until much, much later than in 1966. But I could be wrong...

Casey, I for one am enjoying these old posts that you are bringing forward. And like all of you, I too miss Bob. TIM

Edited January 14, 2015 by tim boyd

[charlie8575]

I love stories like this.

Give me a couple of days, and I could work up a good case study with this.

Charlie Larkin

[Harry P.]

I think it's an interesting story, and I thought others might enjoy reading it, too.

So, do you go through ancient topics every so often just to find something to bring back to life? I mean, you had to really crank up the Way Back machine to max power to pull up a topic from the very beginning of 2007!

Just wondering...

[mrindy77]

I certainly do mind reviving old posts. Why start a new one? Is commenting on older posts breaking some kind of internet etiquette? Just ignore if it causes you to have heartburn.

I mean this in a general sense...not trying to ruffle feathers.

I often wondered if model companies printed new kits in their catalogs just so that other companies would not do them.

Edited January 21, 2015 by mrindy77

[unclescott58]

Casey, thanks for bringing this one back. I too did not belong when this was originally out there. It was a very neat to read. If you know of others like this, please bring them forward for the rest of us to read. I'm sure there is a lot of buried treasure hidden here, that I wouldn't even know about or think of looking for. I enjoyed it.

Scott

[Chuck Kourouklis]

This topic was covered in a kit review of the Revell '50 Olds in the other magazine not long ago, but not nearly in the detail of Bob's post above... And like all of you, I too miss Bob. TIM

Hah! Yeah, I made a broad reference to the facts as I vaguely understood them in a one-sentence sweep for that review - and I think that was based on an exchange you and I had!

Moldy topic or not, I enjoyed seeing this too. The landscape is vastly different now, but I wonder if there was any horse-trading ever done in the context Bob described. "You're doing an X? We were gonna, but we're also looking at a Y - how 'bout you do your X and leave the Y to us?"

Yeah, Bob really seemed like a class act, based on my limited forum exchanges with him.

Edited January 23, 2015 by Chuck Kourouklis

[Danno]

Is there a reason you're reviving 8 year-old zombie threads? I mean, they're kinda interesting but they've been deceased for 8 years.

Is there a reason to not?

[chunkypeanutbutter]

What's the diff between a '49 and '50?

[horsepower]

The front fender molding is the most obvious, plus some interior changes, and about a year.

[ChrisBcritter]

Imagine what a 1964-issue Monogram '49 Olds would probably be like today:

• 1/24 scale
• Minor and not-so-minor body inaccuracies
• Little chassis detail
• Stock parts missing since first issue
• Most custom body and interior parts missing since first issue
• Simplified gasser suspension
• Blown engine with scoop hole in hood
• Street machine wheels and tires last updated in the 1980s
• Interior has stock rear seat, custom front buckets, chrome roll bar, little side detail, a floor shift, '60s era steering wheel and a faintly engraved tach
• Builders complaining on model forums about that old dinosaur of a kit

And if Revell had done it?

• 1/25 scale, thinly molded body with easily broken windshield posts
• Doors and trunk open, but good luck making them line up even if you glue them shut
• All body trim on a flash-laden chrome tree with wavy chrome
• Highly-detailed chassis (warped) with delicately molded suspension components (indistinctly and heavily attached to the sprue)
• Multi-multi-multi-piece engine with few locator pins
• Two-piece rims that try to look like mags on one side and chrome reverse on the other and don't quite look like either, OR shallow mags with thick rims and big flat center caps
• Custom parts gone since the second issue that nobody misses because they were (1) unattractive and (2) didn't fit anyway
• Builders complaining on model forums about that old dinosaur of a kit

Edited January 24, 2015 by ChrisBcritter

[tim boyd]

Lotsa truth in your post, Chris! TIM

PS - If AMT/Ertl had done it when they announced their version, it would have been done extremely well to the 95% level and then stopped there, as it always seemed to me that many of the kits of the late AMT/Ertl/early RC era were excellent efforts that were taken out of the oven before they were quite done.....TB

[checkmate]

Interesting read, always nice to learn a little bit of model car history.

[unclescott58]

Boy Chris, you nailed it on head. In a nut shell, you just gave most of the reasons I disliked Monogram and Revell kits (mainly Revell) from that time period.

Scott

[w451973]

In his latest posting, Jason Rothgeb mentioned the '49 Olds that never was. Stand by for " The Rest of the Story" ( forgive me Paul Harvey ).

Back in ( about ) 1966 I proposed to management of Revell, a '49 Olds coupe. The "bean counters" thought it was a good idea and gave me the go-ahead to start development of the kit. Now, you must understand that in the model industry spying and trying to find out what your competitors are doing is a way of life. I would trade bits of information about Revell for other bits of info from say AMT or Monogram. I always tried to get more than I gave with relative success. To make a long story short, I learned that Monogram was working on an Olds also. In that era, manufacturers had the belief that the market would only support one model of any given 1/1 car. I had no choice but to cancell the Olds kit.

Now, flash forward a coupla years and find your self at a GSLIMCC award brunch. Bob Johnson, then head of Monogram was the keynote speaker. I asked him what became of the Olds project at Monogram. There had been more than enough time to produce it. He stated that when he learned, through his "spy network" that Revell was gonna do the kit, he cancelled his efforts.

As they say, the rest is history.Neither company produced the '49 Olds kit and our hobby missed out on a great choice of a kit.

Bob :shock:

>> In that era, manufacturers had the belief that the market would only support one model of any given 1/1 car. <<

I find this part just a litle hard to beleve when you consider all the 55 and 57 Chevies, just to name a couple, that were done by the big 3.

On a side note I do appreciate when some of these old threads are brought back to the top.