1964—MODEL CARS
It was in 1964 that I began to build model cars that were more elaborate. However, unlike other builders of my generation, whose work was publicized in a half-dozen monthlies that carried model car banners, I focused on building replicas that were based on kits, but of a more tasteful and realistic nature.
My first attempt at an interesting and radical model that was a replica of an unusual and interesting full-scale car, was sparked by a full-page feature in the Chicago Sun-Times sometime in early ’64. It seemed that a local Chicago coachbuilder, Lehmann-Peterson, was building the very first stretch limousines that I’d seen, using new 1964 Lincoln Continental sedans, and they were located three blocks from my home! I sent them a letter, requesting some photos and information, and they kindly responded with a press kit containing a half-dozen glossy 8 X 10s, specifications, and press releases.
(ABOVE) The Lehmann-Peterson prototype posed at Chicago’s downtown airport, Meigs Field.
I purchased 2 1964 Lincoln sedan model kits—a major expense for me at the time, and went about cutting the bodies in order to stretch them a scale 36” (1.44”). The body was no problem, as that vintage of Lincoln had straight, sheer-sided body lines, and cutting the sides and roof to stretch the dimensions was an easy task. However, the interior section, which featured jump seats that faced backwards with a center console, wet bar, and SONY TV set between them, needed to be scratch built. I made this section from basswood, sealed and painted to match the rest of the interior. I covered the roof with textured book cover paper. The body was painted black with a black “vinyl” roof. The interior was light gray with light blue inserts.
Today I look back on that model and shake my head, because at that point in my pursuits, I had no formal training and was plumbing new territory. This type of exact “documentary” replica was nearly unheard of in the hobby and stuff like this virtually NEVER won any contests, due to its museum conservativeness.
Although a professional commercial model maker could probably knock one of these out in a couple of evenings, I spent a month of evenings and weekends on it, and I’m sure I overworked some areas and underworked others. I did complete the model, though, and entered it in a number of local area contests, where it never failed to win at least second, and usuually first prize honors.
Consider that in those days, teen-aged young men concentrated on areas of building that were 180 degrees from where I was working. My fellow 15-year-olds would typically begin with a plastic kit, and then cut and hack and glue the pieces together, with no thought given to design elements of form, mass, or scale, loading them with putty and sculpting them into weird shapes to exorcise their creative demons. The finished products would be painted in grotesque and garish Metalflake colors and often shaded with a contrasting or clashing color. Narrow striping tape would be applied in ornate patterns to finish the paint work. There was lots of chrome on display, super-wide tires poking out from enlarged fender openings, and interiors were flocked with a product called “Funny Fur”, which if it had been brought up to full-size from the 1/25 scale stuff, would be about 6” long!
Then, in contest judging days, along would come this flawless black stock stretch limousine with a “leather” top and tasteful chrome, stock Lincoln Blue engine—not a bit of chrome under the bonnet, and it would sweep the awards. It was heady stuff for my 15-year-old brain and ego!
Another branch of the hobby back then would be featuring as many working features as could be crammed onto a 7” long model car. There were guys who would build motors that would turn and would have working carburetor linkages, a dipstick with a drop of real oil on the tip, and working crank-up windows fitted onto doors that opened and locked with the handles. Working cloth convertible tops were also popular. Still, NOBODY was building accurate scale replicas.
So, my plain glossy black Lincoln limousine would stand out in a contest group by virtue of its tasteful subtlety and simplicity. No operating features were necessary, nor was a tasteless paint job or furry interior on display or necessary to attract attention and garner appreciation from contest judges, who were, in any case, adults and not kids without a grasp on automotive reality.
So I won a number of contests, even as I was dreaming up the next step in my pursuits—a model with a scratchbuilt body, but using kit parts for details like engines, wheels, and tires—items that I was incapable of building myself.
At this time, I had read about the Fisher Body Craftsman’s Guild, an annual contest put on by GM’s Fisher Body Division to encourage young men to develop their talents and interest in car styling. I sent away for a contest package and received a nice, thick envelope in the mail. Upon opening the envelope and reviewing the material, I was impressed by the approach and the rules, and began to plan building one of the 1/12 scale models that were required by the contest.
Then I ran into a snag. I had no clay modeling tools, and had never worked with Chavant modeling clay (great stuff, I discovered fifteen years later, incidentally!). Additionally, when I priced Chavant clay, I realized that there was no way that I could afford the materials necessary to build a contest entry.
Rather than becoming downhearted, I scaled my goals back, borrowing the Craftsman’s Guild’s approach, but applying it to my usual scale of 1/25, which enabled me to concentrate on original design without the encumbrance of high expenses and the need to fashion difficult parts like wheels, tires, and mechanical details like braking systems and engines.
Inspired by the Fisher Body Guild approach, I sketched a three-wheeled vehicle one steerable wheel set under the pointed front, and two seats and the engine in the rear. In plan view, it was arrowhead-shaped, with a simple pointed front end, a bubble-top, and a chopped-off Kamm-type tail. The interior was Pearl White with rolled and pleated seats and pale gray “carpeting” made from some leather scraps that Dad (a custom upholsterer) had in his scrap box. The leather, vat-dyed through its total thickness, was flipped over so the suede side was exposed to replicate carpeting. The engine was a fully- chromed Corvair flat 6-cylinder.The bubble top was hinged and open at the front. The body was made up of several thicknesses of 3/8” basswood and file card stock for return edges and scoop details. The paintwork was a medium blue over silver pearl for a deep and very glossy finish. I developed a paint technique of priming the body with grey rattle-can lacquer primer, then applying two really nice coats of very fine metallic blue with 100% coverage, over which several coats of clear lacquer were applied and allowed to completely dry (usually overnight was sufficient). Over this I would lightly mist another coat of the metallic blue with only 20% coverage. Over this went another wet coat of clear lacquer, with more metallic blue misted over it. One more wet coat of clear, a third mist coat of blue, and then one final wet coat of clear. The depth of this multicoat finish had to be seen to be believed, and once rubbed out and waxed, it was second to none in visual impact. It sounds awfully thick, but was, in fact, only a few thousandths of an inch in thickness.
The bubble top was formed from 1/16” Plexiglas with a blue tint. I found a Plexiglas supplier near my house in the Yellow Pages (remember those?), grabbed a bus about one mile to their retail storefront, and inquired about the blue Plexiglas. The owner, Pete (who I would carry on a vendor/customer relationship well into the 1970s and my career building full-sized cars; more later in the miniWOODIE chapter in 1975), was amused at this kid who wanted to buy one square foot of blue Plexiglas, and for $2.10 I was on my way, brain filled with Pete’s instructions and advice on heat-forming Plexiglas.
Following Pete’s. methods, I made an undersized form for the bubble top from basswood, sealed and smoothed. I formulated my own sealer from airplane “dope” and talcum powder, and sanded and sealed the form until it was smooth. I then I heated the Plexiglas in Mom’s oven until it was nice and droopy. Wearing oven mittens, I grabbed it by two edges and pulled it down over the form, stretching it as I went. My brother stood by with a cloth soaked with cold water to cool the plastic.
I had only a rough idea of what I was doing; I was in new territory here, but after coolinng, I did get a square foot of nasty curled Plexiglas with a perfect model car bubble top in the center. All I had to do was cut the bubble out and trim and polish the edges. (Yeah, right! I had no power tools, and Plexiglas, even in 1/16 inch thickness, is some tough stuff!) It took about ten hours with hand tools to free the bubble from its wrinkled surrounding real estate, and then I took a deep breath, got a good night’s sleep, and went about trimming, sanding, fitting, and polishing.
About 12 boy-hours later, after I got it properly fitted to the rough-primed basswood car body, I decided that it needed to be smoothed inside and out so it looked perfect. Again, I did this completely by hand, wet-sanding with finer and finer grades of sandpaper, beginning with #320, finishing with #2000, and finally hand-buffing it with a cloth and rubbing compound, then following with wax. This stage took three after-school evenings, staying up late. (Nowadays I could do it on my 12” buffer in less than 10 minutes.) I was inventing the process (at least by myself--no internet in those days) as I went along, but at last the finished product was very gratifying.
After assembling the model, I entered it into the Annual Navy Pier Model Contest, and easily took First Place in my class.
That same Summer, the nationwide Revell contest caught my attention, but my financial resources were tapped. I persuaded Gil to work with me in partnership, since he had access to funds. We began to build a model to another of my original designs, again from basswood. This was a larger concept with the plan view of an artist’s palette, with three seats on the longer left side of a central tunnel, and the driver on the shorter right. The roof was cantilevered on five posts, and there were three opening doors. Gil and I spent every day for two months that summer in his basement, building the model. I made one fatal error, though. As the deadline approached and it was time to paint the body, I decided to use enamel rattle-can paint instead of lacquer. Two days before the deadline, when we should have been doing final assembly, the nasty enamel had not dried yet. We missed the deadline. Were we disappointed? Are you kidding? Of course…over-confidence coupled with unfriendly materials had taught me another important lesson.
1964—MUSIC
This was a breakthrough year. I added another passion to the previous two—music. Of course, I was seduced by the pre-Beatles press blitz, and went to Gil’s house to watch their premier US appearance on the Ed Sullivan show (Gil had a color TV). Both Gil and I were completely fascinated. We had already read every Beatles magazine that we could collectively lay our hands on, so we had the scoop. The TV reality of seeing these amazing young men “live”, moving about, and singing and playing their music, stopped us in our tracks. Gil turned to me later that evening and said, “Do you want to start a Beatles group?” Of course the possibilities of this made my head swim, and I answered “Yes!”. He started taking guitar lessons and was given a rented $20 plywood acoustic guitar by his music school. We would trade off playing it on his enclosed back porch, which passed for his family’s recreation room. Neither he nor I could read music, but at least I had a good ear and singing voice due to my years as a chorister in grade school, and a natural sense of rhythm. When he finally handed the guitar to me to play, I worked out the power chord intro and hook to the Rockin’ Rebels “Wild Weekend” (three two-string “power” chords). Guitars were fun! We messed around casually from March through August, when Gil and hid parents returned from a driving vacation to visit relatives in Southern California. On an overnight stop in Denver, Gil got hold of a newspaper and, after scanning the want ads, talked his parents into buying him a used 1953 Fender Telecaster and a Tolini accordion (music school) amplifier for $140.00. When he proudly showed it to me, I was hypnotized. A real Fender! His skills now rapidly improved, and the band became a real possibility.
It was time to stop fooling around, I concluded.
In early September,I transferred to another high school, St. Gregory’s, which had lower tuition and offered art classes as a “major”. I did much better here, both academically and socially, and being able to take art classes really boosted my spirit.
By mid-September, Gil, ever the group leader, assembled two more guys and talked them into buying instruments. A classmate at St. Pat’s, Ray, became our bass player— he was very precise and perfectionist in his method and tone. He played a sunburst Kay Les Paul-styled bass through a Kay bass amplifier with a 15” speaker. Amazing tone for a budget rig--I think it would survive today, sound-wise. Ray’s friend, Tom, bought a cherry red Gibson Les Paul Junior solid body but didn’t have an amplifier, so he plugged into Ray’s bass amp. I ask myself, though I knew the answer—what would Gus’ and Tom’s guitars be worth today? ’53 Telecasters are well into mid-five-figures, and nice Les Paul Junior from 1964 is somewhere North of $10K.
Oh, drummer? We had a fun friend, neighborhood Italian Bad Boy Rich, who bore an amazing resemblance to Ventures’ drummer Mel Taylor, greasy black forelock and all. He was a good-looking guy—a real Lothario, as it turned out. Rich’s father was a Chicago Police detective, and his beat covered the Ludwig Drum plant. Rich coveted a Ludwig Blue Sparkle Pearl drum set just like Ringo’s, but Ludwig was swamped and the Ringo sets were back-ordered nearly a year.
Can you see where this is heading?
Rich’s father made a visit to the factory and “discussed” things with Ludwig’s shipping manager. The next Saturday practice, we helped Rich set up his new Ludwig drums. Within a couple of months, Rich, without any formal lessons, became a more-than-competent drummer considering his age—just 15 at the time.
Since we were fully-filled-out as far as guitars and percussion were concerned, Gil assigned me to keyboards. The only keyboard that I had was Dad’s 1944 Italian Castelfidardo piano accordion, which he had played in a polka-cum-country band at neighborhood taverns a decade earlier. This was an ornate, baroque, rhinestone-encrusted period piece in black celluloid with hand-painted flowers in white and pink and MOP keys. It weighed about 50 pounds, and Dad kept it in a case in the closet. I was forbidden to play it when I was younger, but beginning in 1958, I began sneaking it out and learning stuff by ear. I matched the piano right hand keyboard with the 120 buttons on the left hand side, and even worked out some waltz rhythms and a basic boogie-woogie bass with variations. (HINT: the C tonic bass note on the left button side was the one with the black dot cut into it, with the two bass rows around it in the Circle of Fifths.) I finally, after hours of gentle pressure and a quick demonstration that I knew the basics, convinced Dad to lend it to me for Saturday practices, “Just until I got an organ”. Somewhere I have a photo taken at Gil’s cousin Stanley’s 6th birthday party—our debut performance!—with Gil dressed in his perfectly tailored Beatles suit, gray sharkskin, black velour lapels and all, playing the Telecaster, Ray always a bit shy with plaid shirt and jeans, Rich playing Stanley’s toy kid drum set, and myself in wash pants, striped shirt, with a huge ornate squeezebox, staring at the ceiling in my interpretation of “cool”. It wants to embarrass me now, and I avoid looking at it.
My family was the poorest on the block. We weren’t penniless, but lived paycheck-to-paycheck, with very little disposable income. Mom was a $2.00 per week Christmas Club “member” at the Main State Bank in Bucktown. The other guys had their instruments—not the most expensive, but pro quality nonetheless. A couple of hundred bucks for an organ was out of the question for me.
To do some “research”, I took the EL to downtown Chicago, to Lyon and Healey, a huge music store, and talked to a keyboard salesperson about portable organs. Of course, my ideal was a VOX Continental like the Beatles and Dave Clark Five played. We eventually got to talking about price. $1000.00?? I was floored. Was there anything more “reasonable”, I wondered? Well, I was told, the Farfisa Combo Compact was $700.00. I rode home on the El, depressed. Downhearted. Where was I going to get that kind of money? I was washing dishes at St. Pat’’s every lunchtime, for an entire year, for a mere $50.00 off my tuition! One thousand dollars was, quite simply, out of my range. FAR out of my range.
It took me several weeks to get my spirits back up enough to do some comparison shopping, Right near my neighborhood, on Lincoln Avenue, was an old German music store. I had never stopped in. but I managed to visit them one Saturday afternoon, and I asked about Farfisa organs. They, of course had a Combo Compact in stock, for the $700.00 MSRP, but they were willing to deal. However, I had nothing to deal with. They did have a lower-price-point Farfisa in stock. It was a small chord organ, but unlike others of its kind, it had a Tolex-wrapped case and detachable legs in other words, it was a portable, semi-professional instrument, not a kid’s toy, as a lot of chord organs were back then. The price was $79.00 (a full $800.00 in 2024 dollars). I swallowed hard, borrowed the money from my grandma Helen and bought the organ a couple of days later.
(ABOVE) My beloved Farfisa “PORTORGAN” reed organ, from 1964. Still have it today!
I was inordinately proud of this little keyboard, and in fact, I still have it! It became the anchor keyboard for my 20-vintage-keyboasrd collection. Sixteen of these I sold to a collector in Los Angeles so I wouldn’t have to crate them and schlep them to Italy, where space to set them up would be scarce.
This little cutie was covered in two-tone gray vinyl, with darker grey vinyl rub strips running all around each end. The top was embellished with a molded plastic emblem; circular, about 4” in diameter, with lettering that said, “Portorgan Farfisa”. You can see these features in the photo above.
Gil’s aunt Jean, who lived in the apartment upstairs from his, saw the Farfisa when I brought it over and she offered to sew up a vinyl cover for it so I could take it on the bus to practices. She made a gold vinyl cover with a circular cutout for the logo badge, and a bag for the legs. I carted this organ on the Chicago bus every Saturday afternoon, going to Ray’s house for group practice. I quickly found out that it was not loud enough without amplification. It was a reed organ, with a fan blowing air through a set of accordion reeds. It had one “voice”, or sound, and was really anemic, I had to admit.
After giving it some thought, I purchased a microphone at Allied Radio (not yet “Radio Shack”), and set to installing it inside the organ’s cabinet. I never had any fear of taking things apart. I installed the mic, along with a 1/4” standard output jack and a volume control pot that I learned how to wire by trial and error, in a panel made from sheet plastic, and cut a square hole in the side to accept the panel. I had no power tools; it was all done with a great deal of effort by hand. But the Visible V8 project had taught me the values of patience and perseverance, and when this modification was completed, it looked “factory”. I lettered “OTTO MATIC” on an inside surface—my nod to the organ player of the Rivieras, whose name was Otto Nuss. (Otto, of course, played a VOX Continental. Rich kid.)
It looked the part and sounded OK, if I kept the volume down. Volume turned too far up, it sounded too shrill. People complained. I had never heard of treble cut circuits (two components and an inch or so of wire!) After a few months, I decided I needed to upgrade.
The “upgrade” was a used 1948 Hammond Solovox. More on that in 1966.