THE FOLLOWING IS EXCERPTED FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES, and, yeah, okay, is probably a guy thing, as you will note. And a strange "guy thing" it can be. It's not about the nuts and bolts, it's all about style when you collect die-casts. It's about which ones do you have, or don't have; which ones do you want? I know, for example, I have multiple versions (at least 4,) of basically the same mid-60's Lincoln 4-door convertible from Hot Wheels. The difference between them? The paint jobs, mostly; packaged and marketed as they were in different ways, but basically the same car, they're still all unique. Same with my multiple versions of Buick's classic '64 Riviera. I love concept cars, and have several iterations of the Lincoln Futura from 1955, which became the '60s Batmobile, as I have stated previously. Camaros and Mustangs of ilks nearly incalculable, mostly from the late 1960s. I wish I still HAD some from the late 1960s, some of the cars I had when I was a child. Precious and valuable though they might be, I'm still not convinced anything could ever allow my to be parted from them, were they still in my possession. Sigh. Somewhere is my Alfa-Romeo BAT-9 from Hot Wheels, an aerodynamic exercise by that Italian automaker in the early-to-mid 1950s. And I know for certain that my prized Ferrari 166MM, an early, and not peculiarly attractive model, is still in storage, along with many others; the large-scale Johnny Lightning T-Bucket, a gorgeous BBurago Mercedes from the 1930s, and one of my other favorites (both as a die-cast and a real car,) a 1961 Jaguar E-Type. For a long while, I gravitated towards the die-casts that were available in kit form, just to keep my hands busy, although these days even those are getting hard to come by. And as with real cars, you've gotta make your moves in the right time frame, or the ones you REALLY want will be long gone. More than anything with regard to what the author below says about die-casts and having daughters is true; inevitably, your collection will either be mishandled, or all yours. Double sigh. Ah, well, there's always nephews. One of mine still adores the highway truck with the flashing lights that I sent him back from Korea. But that's another story.
By ADAM BRYANT
Published: July 29, 2007
THE obituary of the inventor of Matchbox cars, Jack Odell, who died at 87 on July 7, quoted him as saying almost four decades ago that he wanted to be remembered as a “damn good engineer.”
Jack Odell, 87, Designer of Matchbox Cars, Is Dead (July 17, 2007)
It was a remarkable bit of understatement from a man who so completely captured the imagination of junior car buffs around the world. He made his first one for his daughter, Anne, and they took off from there, eventually selling billions. Collectors would spend hours playing with, critiquing, and pitting their cars against one another in imaginary high-stakes races.
I should know. I was one of them.
In grade school, my car collection was a consuming hobby. I saved allowances, then carefully weighed every new purchase based on some complex metric involving authenticity, likely speed on a track, and, of course, the cool factor.
I faced difficult choices. I bought a folding carrying case to hold my Matchbox and Hot Wheels collection, but it held only 72 cars. These were choice spots, given to those classic muscle cars like Mustangs, Challengers and Camaros, nestled behind plastic windows, sealed off from the elements. Every new car I bought meant another would have to be swapped out, fending for itself on the shelf. The cars that made the cut were so well cared for, I thought they would last forever.
Inevitably, I moved on to sports, and my carrying case wound up deep in the back of my closet. Sure, I was still interested in cars — I often tested myself by guessing the model of a car at night just by the shape of its taillights from 50 yards away.
By high school, I wanted a real car, and delivered papers for three years to save $1,000. The ’69 Beetle I bought from a neighbor cost me $200 (I had to put a bit of money into it for necessary upgrades, including a leather and wood gearshift knob).
I thought of my collection again when I was 29, and my wife, Jeanetta, was pregnant with our first child. Any offspring of mine would surely cherish my cars and see challenging hills and jumps for a dune buggy in the folds of a blanket, just as I once did.
Several years later, I would occasionally haul out my collection for our first daughter, Anna, and then our second, Sophia, to see if it would take. Unlike with Anne Odell, it did not. My Matchboxes were given bit parts in Polly Pocket dramas, or used as skateboards for trolls.
I brought them out when friends came over with their children. I winced at first when some of them would crash my Lamborghini Marzal, Mercury Cougar and other prized models from the ’60s. Over time, wheels went missing. Paint jobs were nicked. Cleanup was a pain, and my carrying case was replaced by one of those big tin popcorn bins. I peered inside recently — it looked like a sinkhole had swallowed up a traffic jam.
The bin has a lid, though, and I make sure it’s shut tight. Someday, after all, there will be grandchildren. And maybe my car collection, inspired by a damn good engineer, will get a second life.