Official Shot Glass of Steely Eyed Missile Men

In this week's STB, we take a look at an item that I picked up years ago at a flea market. I give you, the official White Sands shot glass!

Now, instead of "a shot of redeye" (whatever the heck that is) I've stuffed it with cotton so you can see the logo better. This is the same logo they use today, so I can't be sure how old the glass is. I do know that is seems like the museum gift store doesn't carry them any more (although you can get a coffee mug...but how rough and tough is that?)

I like the thought of test pilots knocking one back after a crazy dangerous test....but they probably wouldn't have used a souvenir glass.... Anyway, it's a romantic thought. Mine just sits on the shelf.

Someday, I hope to get out to White Sands (my wife has been).

Until next time, fly 'em fast and high!

It Was The Summer of '77....

When you have a business of buying and selling collectibles, sometimes you run into interesting items that you weren't expecting... Ok, a lot of times you run into items you weren't expecting....which is what makes it so much fun!

For example, a while back I bought a nice stack of '50s and '60s Hot Rod magazines and 60's and 70's Mad magazines. In the middle of the bunch, I found this:

Yep, Star Wars was the hottest movie of the year and People Magazine was doing their best to capture some of that glory (as was literally everyone else in the entertainment industry). I shot pics of the article. If you click on the pictures and zoom in, you should have no trouble reading it. Also, note the ads. Always good stuff there!

And as an added bonus, I found these drawings inside the magazine. Obviously, this was owned by a true fan! He was pretty good at drawing too...

I probably won't sell the magazine because it's not in great shape, and I think it's cooler than what I could get for it.

So there you have it! I hope everybody enjoyed our little trip down memory lane! Until next time, fly 'em fast and high!

A Wonderful Kit I Never Built...

Welcome back to STB! This week we're going to take a look at a kit that has bugged me for years....but soon shall no more. The kit I'm talking about is the 1999 version of Estes' Saturn V!

My lovely wife bought me this kit for our first anniversary almost ten years ago. I had spotted it at Bill's Hobbies in Irving and since the first anniversary is "paper," it seemed perfect!

Now, at the time the kit had been out of production for about eight years and each year that passed something happened....The kit got more and more collectible...Which meant that it got more and more difficult to think about opening it...much less building it!

You must understand,  I love the Estes Saturn V. I've been quoted as saying it's one of the best kits Estes ever produced. At 37 inches long, even the box is impressive. I've built two Saturn V's over the years. I WANT to build this rocket!!!

Now, I may have a chance to have my cake and build it too! Estes is releasing it again! That means I can keep my unopened 17 year old collector kit...and build the new kit guilt free!!!

Yep! I now know what I want for Christmas.

Until next time, fly 'em fast and high!

It Pays to Know Where Your Towel Is

I have a quick one for you guys this week, and it's not even really rocketry related (although the sci-fi cred is pretty high). As I was looking about, wondering what to write about this week, my eyes fell upon this:

Yep, it's Zaphod and Jeltz from the greatest sci-fi parody ever (although "Galaxy Quest" is a close second) "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy!"

My daughter (a.k.a. "coolest kid in the world") got these guys for me a number of years ago. They are from the 2005 movie version, which some purists didn't like, but I thought was wonderful. The detailing on these guys is fantastic, which means these are "collectibles" not "toys."

On a side note, I think I would vote for Galactic President Zaphod this year, all things considered...Maybe not the Vogon, though.

The point of all of this is that it's fun to have little sci-fi or rocket related things strung about your office, and I'm pretty sure they increase productivity by making you feel better. So there.

Until next time, fly 'em fast and high!

Fun With Paper!

Hello campers! This week's blog post is a day late (and a dollar short) due to my having to play shade tree mechanic yesterday. Ah, tis life. Still, we've got a pretty good one this week...

Paper models!!!! Now, I know that technically almost all model rockets are made (at least partly) of paper. However, several years ago while roaming the ol' interwebs, I stumbled across the world of paper models.

Paper models were not unknown to me. After all, I had the Gulf Oil LEM model as a kid (and have a framed, unused copy in my office now). But now you can download these models and print them out yourself...usually for free!

How do they look? Well, here is a V2 that I printed out and put together a few years ago. I didn't do a great job on it, but it still looks pretty good:

Also, I'm sure you could convert these to fly pretty easily.

If you would like to look at a few that are offered, you can start here http://jleslie48.com/gallery_models_real.html

Until next time, fly 'em fast and high!