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Post by hairy on Sept 14, 2011 1:22:21 GMT 12
A question posed by kb on aeromedias facinating "Harvard from the brink" thread ( rnzaf.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=Airshows&action=display&thread=14111&page=1 ) got me wondering................ The question was "How many of us are collectors?", so how many of us have the pack-rat gene and what do we have? If we know what each of us is into, we can help each other, something that has already happened quite a few times, for example I have been loaning photos to flyernzl for his excellent studies on the Catalina, Shorts flying boats and his current series on the NZ civil DC-3s. There have been glimpses here and there of what people on the board have, Dave with his recorded interviews, several members with aircraft projects, several avid modellers, Radialicious with his engines etc. so what else is out there.............. To get the ball rolling, my humble collection. My main focus is aviation photos, I currently have about 10,000 (ish) and counting, including a large number of original Whites Aviation prints and several thousand original Whites Aviation negatives. (I have quite a few duplicate prints which I may be interested in trading.) Other aviation related stuff that I have includes; - 44 aircraft and powerplant manuals, from a Percival Proctor V repair manual through to a Mig-29 Flight Manual. - 30 1:200 (or larger) airliner models (mainly Air NZ or Cargo aircraft). - 3 Manufacturers presentation models - 1:40 RNZAF F-16, 1:72 RNZAF F-18(!) and an Embraer 170 - 2 flying helmets - Gentex SPH-4 and an RAF MK.2 flying helmet and oxygen mask (has "Cohen" written in the inside, I was told it has Falklands war history but that remains to be seen.) - 29 Osprey aerospace series books. (looking for more) - A couple of bookcases of aviation books - A complete set of Classic Wings magazines - A lot of bits and pieces that have tickled my fancy over the years (e.g Alloy NAA knee board that came with the RNZAF Harvards, a couple of Sunderland engine levers (1 with green knob and 1 with a red knob), a leverarch file of documents etc. etc) Non-aviation; - 20 1:18 Die-cast Ferraris (including the 2 best looking cars ever made, the 1967 330 P4 and the 1962 Ferrari 250 GT SWB Berlinetta Competizione) - (must get round to moving these on) - 25+ Giles annuals - a growing number of Robert Heinlein books - all of John Varley's books - all of Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan books - all of Stephen Coonts's books - 15+ years of Viz comics. ;D After listing all of that I am starting to think I should get out more. So, what do you have, what are you after and what have you got to trade? I am looking forward to hearing about your treasure troves.
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Post by jonesy on Sept 14, 2011 8:57:49 GMT 12
You'd lost me there till I saw 15yrs of Viz comics! Actually its a very good idea you've got here, and sometimes guys really arent aware how how much "treasure"they really have until its documented. Me, I'm not a collector, but SERIOUSLY wish I had kept stuff as I got hold of it. Most of my RNZAF stuff was given away when I left NZ, or just destroyed (including my uniform, hung on the clothesline, soaked in petrol and set on fire. Seemed like a good idea at the time ). Am interested so see just how much stuff you guys have, and how lucky you are to have kept it! (Actually I do still have my 2 sqn patches, including Project Kahu stuff.)
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Post by mit on Sept 14, 2011 11:49:26 GMT 12
- A lot of bits and pieces that have tickled my fancy over the years (e.g Alloy NAA knee board that came with the RNZAF Harvards, a couple of Sunderland engine levers (1 with green knob and 1 with a red knob), a leverarch file of documents etc. etc) I've always wanted one of those knee boards, I have only ever seen pictures. Where did you find it? Cheers mit
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Post by nzompilot on Sept 14, 2011 14:49:28 GMT 12
I am a prolific collector when I can afford to be. Even dragging the whole thing across the ditch with me when I moved over.
My main area of collection is civilian aviation, focusing on NZ and Australian airlines, but by no way limited to these.
I too have an extensive collection of photos, negatives etc totaling in the thousands but I bow to a superior 10K+ collection.
I have hundreds of in flight magazines from many different airlines and every time a friend or acquaintance travels somewhere the standard & standing instruction of, the minimum required off your flight is the magazine, followed by anything airline branded and not nailed down, is issued or reminded. Its great to see all who support me in this, to the point I some months get 3-5 copies of the same in flight magazine - not that I'm complaining.
I also have an extensive but not big enough to my likings collection of aircraft models and am continually on the look out for more, or rare editions of special liveries etc.
I have bookshelves full of aviation books, and box after box of bits and pieces I've picked up all over the shop.
Something I'm getting more into now is collecting early advertising from the different airlines that grace or used to grace our skies.
I also have a reasonable sized collection of DVDs of all sorts of aviation shows, documentaries, etc that as with everything else continues to grow.
I also have a large collection of newspaper cuttings of aviation stories, which continues to grow from both sides of the tasman.
One thing I have always said and should get legally documented, is if I meet an untimely fate then my collection cannot be broken up and sold. It should be kept together as a single collection, possibly at a museum or similar institution where it can be enjoyed by others.
Non-Aviation Greg Iles books (entire catalogue to date)
Now for the odd ones to make you wonder about my sanity
A collection which is slightly odd, which I began in Melbourne in 1999, shopping bags. Not the boring plastic supermarket variety, but the branded, ritzier ones from other stores. It kinda started as a way to remind myself where I'd been on holiday and has grown from there.
I also seem to have collected a large amount of social media/networking accounts and blogs, over 20 at last count - not sure if this can be classed as a collection or just "work related"
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Post by Dave Homewood on Sept 14, 2011 15:01:41 GMT 12
I definately have the gene. I got it from both Mum and Dad.
These days the only thing I really like to collect RNZAF information, on video tape and audio recording, written down in documentation and in books, photographs, and via the forum - and of course I collect loads of good friends via the forum too.
As Marcus said I like to interview WWII veterans and I like to collect their stories for posterity. That includes scanning their photos digitally, and scanning or photographing related documentation. Photographing Flying Logbooks is a big passion. I love reading them and find them fascinating.
However the collecting bug was at it's worst for when I was much younger. As a kid I collected old and/or foreign coins, and stamps, and matchboxes with interesting pictures on them and Matchbox MB38 'Model A Van' vans. I still have all these collections tucked away I think, but have not added to them or really thought about them for many years. The coin and stamp collection have some sentamental value, but I'd gladly shift the Matchboxes and the Model A vans if I could make some cash from them.
One of my stamps is a 1 cent butterfly stamp from the 1970's which I simply got off an envelope at about age 7. Years later I noted it was different from the same stamp beside it, and it turned out it was missing an entire colour! I took it to a stamp dealer shop in Hamilton in the mid-1990's to see what they made of it and the guy said yes, it was a flawed run of the stamp, there were several thousand printed wrongly. He offered me $50 for it. $50 for a 1c stamp was quite a mark up but I was too canny to part with it for what sounded like a low bid for a flawed stamp. Some of them make hundreds of thousands. i never trust dealer offers of any kind, they're always out to make as much as they can themselves. And who knows if it really was one of 10,000 as he said, or maybe one of only one sheet! So I declined and kept it. I'd like to find out its true value though. Is it really only worth $50 (or maybe $100 by now 15 years later). Or am I sitting on a fortune I wonder? PS don't come robbing my house for it as it isn't here!!
Once I had shaken off all those childhood collecting fads of coins, stamps, toy vans and the odd, wierd one of matchbooks and matchboxes (which I have no idea how and when started!) I turned to more important things and I began collecting issues of New Zealand Wings, old and new, in 1990. I was in the RNZAF so Dad thought I should take his collection of Wings that dated from about 1978-1988 though with many gaps. I suscribed to the new issues for many years till a little after Ross Macpherson passed away and I stopped buying it because the historic RNZAF content lessened and Classic Wings Downunder had taken up the slack on the warbird scene, but I continued to seek out old issues to fill the gaps in. That collection is still a pride of mine and used often to check on data.
Oh, and of course being an ex-modeller with still a strong interest and desire but no time, I have a 'stash' of collected and unbuilt kits in the cupboards too. But all modellers have them. I collected a lot of those because a) they were given to me or b) they were cheap at the time and the Scottish blood in me made me buy them regardless. Others are ones I want to make someday, eventually, if the world stops and I find the time suddenly.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Sept 14, 2011 15:11:26 GMT 12
I might elaborate a bit on my childhood collections:
The coins sort of all came to me - Dad had his own childhood collection and one day he gave it to me. The oldest was a penny from 1820. Nana then bought me a coin folder, and when people turned up at Mum and Dad's I was often asked to bring out the collection to show them. Those people would then return with odd coins they picked up here and there, and like Craig's standing order for airline magazines mine was for a coin or two brought back from foreign climes. Many people did bring me back coins, especially our great neighbour Pat Monk who travelled the world with his aircraft design consultancy. Every time he returned he had a handful of coins for me. He was gutted when China wouldn't let him take any for me, but that was the 1980's Cold War days. I was always thrilled when someone brougt me a new addition to the collection, I guess that thrill on a kid's face must be why they did it.
The stamp collection started when I was about four. Mum and my siblings all collected them too. It slowly built up and then a local book exchange that sold collectors stamps became a haunt for me and every now and then I grabbed a new set. Just whatever took my fancy to start with but eventually I decided to only buy aviation and space related ones. We got a lot from Norfolk Island too as Mum and Dad went there often and took all us kds one by one at least once, and they had friends there. lots of Norfolk Is. aviation stamps. If anyone is interested I could scan some of the aviation and space stamps and add them here.
I have no idea when, how or why the matchbox and matchbook collection began at all. As I said I now think it's quite a wierd one. I assume they must have sold them at the book exchange too, and then those same people who looked for coins for me also used to bring matchboxes from all over that they'd picked up. In those days of heavy smoking matches were everywhere and often free gifts at bars, motels, etc. I look back now and have no idea why that collection even came about. There are some pretty interesting ones in there though. Does anyone else collect matchboxes?? Maybe I can sell my collection, if I can find it. ;D
The Matchbox MB38 die cast Model A van was something that I took a shine to when I was about 12. I used to buy Matchbox cars with pocket money from when I was younger just to play with, but the Model A van was different, not a hot rod or Corvette but a historic van. I think maybe this was the first time I began to take an interest in history! Then because it had nice flat sides on the van compartment Matchbox began putting them out every few months with new sponsors' livery. I got hooked. I checked every toy store I could for many years and often found a new one. I think I collected about 35 different ones before finally growing out of it. The last ones I bought were in 1989 in Christchurch when I was 18, at Acorn Models, and I picked up about five different ones. Afterwards I realised I was probably ripped off but that collecting adrenaline made me do it. I went cold turkey from then on. I recently looked to see if they had climbed in value in the last 20 years (as everyone who collected Matchbox back then used to profess they would) and the values now seem to be around the same as what I paid for them. Damn! I would be happy to sell the lot if I could find someone keen enough to buy them as a set.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Sept 14, 2011 15:17:58 GMT 12
I forgot to add I also collect memorabilia related to Dad's Army. I ran the Dad's Army Appreciation Society New Zealand Branch for many years as a lot of you know, and through that i managed to collect a lot of the old 1970's merchandise, and then the more modern books and autobiographies. I have many books signed by the authors, often the actors themselves. I got to know all the surviving cast as they were members of the society and great friends. So I have autographs from Clive Dunn, Bill Pertwee, Ian Lavender, Frank Williams, Jimmy perry and David Croft, Pam Cundell, etc. Perhaps the rarest item of all though is Ted Sinclair's autograph, who played the Verger, who died in 1977. His lovely wife wrote back to me after I'd sent her a copy of the magazine I edited for the society and she kindly sent me an autographed photo of his that she's kept more than 20 years. She has since passed away. He was one of the lesser actors and died young so his autograph must be a rarity and is very special to me indeed. OK, so now you know just how strange my collecting habits really are. I know, I should have devoted all this time to collecting WWII aircraft bits like the rest of you...
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Post by Peter Lewis on Sept 14, 2011 15:58:16 GMT 12
A full collection of AHSNZ publications, currently in total disarray. A Fraser-Nash FN13 turret ex-RNZAF Sunderland. The usual NZ aviation books. My Air Scout shirt from the 1960s. Database collection of info on NZ aircraft. 50 years of aviation memories . . . and some photographs.
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Post by jonesy on Sept 14, 2011 16:06:38 GMT 12
And add to this: what you used to have in your collection, no longer have, and really regret the fact. Cos I'm sure theres lots there too!
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Post by johnnyfalcon on Sept 14, 2011 16:10:45 GMT 12
Well I'm very much in the "If only..." camp. If only I had the foresight, money, time, spine etc etc.
Can lay claim to a complete collection of 'Classic Wings Down Under'/Classic Wings magazine... Does that count?
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Post by aeromedia on Sept 14, 2011 20:22:23 GMT 12
It's never too late to start. It's amazing just what you can achieve if you take that first step and have the passion.
Re Classic Wings Magazine, all power to Graham and Jane and what they have achieved with the mag. I remember the very first one on sale at Warbirds Over Wanaka all those years ago. A lot of great vintage and classic aeroplane stories covered since then !!!!!!! Couldn't live without my CW fix!
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Post by Dave Homewood on Sept 14, 2011 21:08:58 GMT 12
I found the very first copy of Classic Wings Downunder in the Chartwell Square bookshop, and loved it so much I soon subscribed, so I have every issue. Every year Mum buys me the sub for my birthday now, the gift that keeps on giving. It has worldwide following now and is a great magazine. It's always interesting to see the comments on WIX forum about it by American readers who say it is far better than any of their own warbird magazines. Great work by all the CW team past and present.
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hvd51
Leading Aircraftman
Posts: 6
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Post by hvd51 on Sept 14, 2011 23:03:12 GMT 12
- A lot of bits and pieces that have tickled my fancy over the years (e.g Alloy NAA knee board that came with the RNZAF Harvards, a couple of Sunderland engine levers (1 with green knob and 1 with a red knob), a leverarch file of documents etc. etc) I've always wanted one of those knee boards, I have only ever seen pictures. Where did you find it? Cheers mit Hey Mit, havnt seen you for some years!!!. I do still have one of those kneeboards too......because of your dad , i got inflickted by the harvard bug or disease , or whatever it was , seems to last a lifetime though!!!.. For memory, I found mine screwed to a shed wall in blenheim......just before i had secured the fuselage of NZ1051. so in essence it was the first piece of harvard i ever owned......ive still got it, (sits no further than 12" away from me now in fact!)and it will probably be the last piece i ever own....holds alot of sentiment to me because it was "the start of it all" . Must catch up sometime, regards, Lyndon (ex NZ1051)
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Post by vs on Sept 15, 2011 0:02:15 GMT 12
Cool bit of aviation memorabilia I have is a used Concorde turbine blade. It is signed by the captain of the last British Airways Concorde flight. Came framed and has a cool Concorde picture and a plaque describing the engine, signature and that the blade was used in supersonic flight on a Concorde. On the back of the frame is a signed authentication from British Airways.
dave, I don't have any viz comics, but have their dictionary called the Profanasurus, The Magna Farta....The Worlds Sweariest Dictionary! Haha
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Post by ozrbfan on Sept 15, 2011 2:55:40 GMT 12
i have an instrument from a boomerang (really that's all i have).... but i also have a rather large(and growing even though i'm modeling pretty actively at the moment)stash of plastic models(mainly raaf and Japanese ww11) a lot of aviation books and magazines(pretty sure i have most of classic wings) non aviation... model cars diacast ,kits and afx slot cars model trains dinosaurs(well a couple of fossils,(icthyosaur back bone my prized possession) about 250 zoids (ask you kids if they're around 17 to 21) anime collectible figures and my most treasured(other than the fossil) a former bathurst isuzu gemini race car(long term project) ....maybe my wife is right i do have too many hobbies..............NAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Post by Dave Homewood on Sept 15, 2011 12:13:08 GMT 12
We'd love to see some of your models!
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Post by thomarse on Sept 15, 2011 12:57:41 GMT 12
Like others, nearly 60 years of memories.
1000 hours of expensive memories in a logbook, a dead CPL and "D" Cat.
A few colour slides which I'll get scanned one day plus a number of books.
Also have an extensive collection of Civil Aircraft Accident Reports. Anyone else got these? I have a project in mind.
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Post by flyjoe180 on Sept 15, 2011 16:43:52 GMT 12
thomarse, Auckland Aero Club has boxes of those reports filed away.
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Post by FlyingKiwi on Sept 15, 2011 20:19:23 GMT 12
I've got a reasonably large and growing collection of aviation books, in particular textbooks from the WWII era and earlier.
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Post by hairy on Sept 15, 2011 20:45:16 GMT 12
I'm liking the way this thread is starting to flesh out, thanks to those who have posted so far. I've always wanted one of those knee boards, I have only ever seen pictures. Where did you find it? Cheers mit Hi mit, I got mine off an ex.Air NZ pilot who was in the RNZAF in the '50s. Here's some pictures if you're interested....................... I do have a question for those more knowledgeable than myself, were these knee boards assigned to a particular aircraft, hence the red 25 and other crossed out numbers? Stan Smith also has one which he uses regularly after replacing the strap with something a bit more user friendly.
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