As *spoon* as Arch comes back from vacation Hepcat will still be Hepcat. 8 8

[Sqeggs]

And hanging on the opposite wall from the stained glass window is the original art for the 1972 rerelease of the "Song of the South" movie poster which I acquired through a Hake's auction about five years ago:

 

 

 

It's too bad that Disney won't rerelease the film. I understand the reasons, but I think people are able to put the film in the context of the times during which it was made.

[LetThereBeComics-migration]

Hepcat agrees with you!

 

"Present day detractors should be ashamed of themselves. The people who find this movie objectional are part of the professional agitating crowd and as such are nothing but individual_without_enough_empathys."

[chrisco37]

It's too bad that Disney won't rerelease the film. I understand the reasons, but I think people are able to put the film in the context of the times during which it was made.

 

There are enough people out there that would cause a stir. Disney doesn't want any part of that. They're fat & happy and will do anything to protect the brand and keep it that way.

 

We won't see this movie anytime soon.

[Sqeggs]

It's too bad that Disney won't rerelease the film. I understand the reasons, but I think people are able to put the film in the context of the times during which it was made.

 

There are enough people out there that would cause a stir. Disney doesn't want any part of that. They're fat & happy and will do anything to protect the brand and keep it that way.

 

We won't see this movie anytime soon.

 

I would think they would be ok putting out a Blu-ray or DVD with commentary and added features intended to put the film in context. It was a significant movie in the history of film animation. It isn't right to keep it locked away. Heck, one of their most popular rides at Disney World and Disneyland is based on this movie.

[Hepcat]

The professional agitating crowd be damned. I wish Disney would just rerelease the movie for fans on DVD and Blu-ray without any kissing up to that lot.

 

[Hepcat]

Here's Deuce with a bird's eye view of The MAN and me contesting our very own version of the Daytona 500:

 

 

 

 

 

[ComicConnoisseur]

The professional agitating crowd be damned. I wish Disney would just rerelease the movie for fans on DVD and Blu-ray without any kissing up to that lot.

 

My 75 year old uncle loves that movie. I had to get him the dvd from Ioffer.com

for his birthday.

I couldn`t find any on Ebay,as only Ioffer.com had it.

 

[Hepcat]

Here are some photos from Xmas a few years back of my dearly departed sister Phoebe. Here she is in the large bedroom:

 

 

 

Up on the tower of power:

 

 

 

And with our buddy Blizzard by the Xmas tree:

 

 

[Hepcat]

With the playoffs approaching, we pulled out a few of my hockey jerseys last week just to admire them:

 

Worcester IceCats

 

 

 

 

Bridgeport Sound Tigers

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 26, 2013 by Hepcat

[Hepcat]

Walpurgisnacht is just days away and I can hardly wait!

 

 

[Hepcat]

It's coming, it's coming!

 

 

Edited April 30, 2013 by Hepcat

[Hepcat]

Yippee!! It's tonight!

 

 

 

 

[Hepcat]

Heeeee, heeeeee, heeeee! I haven't had this much fun since Halloween!

 

 

[Hepcat]

Here is my Aurora P-38 Lightning kit with fabulous Jo Kotula box art:

 

 

It was the first plane model I built as a kid. My buddy Paul suggested I paint it so I did, entirely in blue with visible brush strokes. An absolutely terrible job to be sure. As a result, I never attempted to paint another model until I assembled a Mummy some four years later.

 

Here are a couple of pictures of my bigger and more sophisticated Monogram Lightning kit as well:

 

 

 

Here are photos of some of my other warplane model kits:

 

 

I was delighted to find the above Revell Dam Buster on Fleabay eleven or so years ago. I believe it was the second model airplane kit I built as a kid. I first saw the Dam Buster kit in late 1963 or early 1964 at McCormick's Hobby Shop clear on the other side of downtown on Oxford Street in London, Ontario. It was run from a small counter at the back of a slightly larger room jam packed with model kits by a pleasant middle aged lady. She ran the shop until sometime in the mid nineties. What I failed to realize all those years though is that she had a treasure trove of unsold back stock in the rear room behind the counter, everything from unsold figure kits to slot car kits! The fellows that bought her out scored big time on the back stock.

 

The Dam Buster started me on a tear of building warplanes and warships. Included among these were a half dozen Hawk WWII fighters in boxes with the hawk's head logo that my corner store, Les' Variety, stocked on the upper shelf across from the cash register. I recall building Hurricane, Messerschmitt and Focke-Wulf kits for sure, and then maybe Spitfire, Mustang, Thunderbolt, Warhawk, Zero and Fokker Triplane kits. It's possible that some of these may have been Aurora kits but I believe most were Hawk. My military model kit building spree ended when my sister vacuum cleaned my built kits thus sucking up some tiny parts here and there. This of course broke my heart and caused me to lose interest. My father probably pitched them all when I went off to boarding school in Kennebunkport, Maine for grade nine.

 

Here are the Hawk warplane kits I currently have in my model kit collection:

 

 

My focus is on the ones with the hawk's head logo. I don't yet have any of the Hawk planes I built as a kid though. Quite simply, the Hawk kits were never as popular as Aurora or Revell kits and as a result they're much more difficult to find these days.

 

The two model airplane kits I most clearly remember from my school days are the Aurora MIG-19 and CF-105. They were the two finished models I had suspended from my bedroom ceiling with scotch tape and thread. Once again, I can't remember when they disappeared but I believe it was sometime after my high school years when I moved into the bigger bedroom that my older sister vacated.

 

Because I so clearly remember the two, I snapped up the CF-105 as soon as I stumbled across one at a toy show here in Toronto some thirty years ago. Because the CF-105 is a Canadian designed fighter, this Aurora kit is particularly popular here in Canada. The MIG-19 I thought was one of those things forever lost in the mists of time until the advent of the internet and Ebay when I realized it was relatively easy to find.

 

Here are some pictures:

 

 

 

 

 

[Hepcat]

My first exposure to comics was in the comic section of the Saturday London Free Press in the late fifties. The Uncle Remus and his Tales of Brer Rabbit strip may have been the very first to capture my attention:

 

 

I'm still a fan of the Uncle Remus characters after all these years and I have dozens of copies of the strip in my collection today.

 

The first comic books I can remember reading in the spring and summer of 1959 featured Felix's Nephews Inky & Dinky. I recall my buddy and I from across the street thought that Dinky was a very cool name! They were of course rather beat up and I have no clue as to the actual issue(s) but here's one from my collection today:

 

 

The first comics I can recall buying were the Cicero's Cat 1 and 2 in the summer of 1959. I bought them at Ken's Variety on Wharncliffe Road in London, Ontario and I very clearly remember my father initially telling me to take #2 back because he thought I already had a copy!

 

 

 

Though I was already familiar with Superman and Batman comics from the barber shop or wherever, the first superhero comics I distinctly remember reading were the Adventures of the Fly in early 1961. I remember reading them at Lamont & Perkins drugstore a block away on Wortley Road before they chased me out, at which point I'd head for Tyler & Zettel's pharmacy a few blocks away. I believe they only stocked Archie, Dell and Classics Illustrated comics in these drug stores which is why the Fly was the first superhero to catch my attention. I'm not sure which issue of the Adventures of the Fly first captured my attention but it may have been #11 or #12:

 

 

Bethlehem copy

 

 

In any event, I very clearly remember seeing these ads in Adventures of the Fly 13 heralding the introduction of Fly Girl and the Jaguar:

 

 

 

I also read through the Adventures of the Jaguar 1 when it first hit the newstand:

 

 

It included this dandy ad for the mysterious Fly Girl:

 

 

A copy of Space Adventures belonging to the older brother of a buddy of mine featuring the powerful Captain Atom further whetted my appetite for the pajama brigade. The memory of these pages featuring a Nikita Kruschev like character has never left me:

 

 

 

The first DC superhero comic I can specifically remember reading was Green Lantern 11 in the spring of 1962 which a buddy on a farm outside of London had. I still remember how it filled me with a sense of awe and wonder at the time.

 

 

A copy of Justice League of America 8 that I read at summer camp a couple of months later that same year clinched the deal:

 

 

When I got home from summer camp, I marched right down to Les' Variety on the corner to check out the comics on the spinner rack. The first superhero comic I bought was Justice League 14.

 

 

I eventually succeeding in trading for all but a couple of the issues of Justice League down to issue #4:

 

 

The other superhero comics I bought off the spinner rack at Les' Variety as part of that first batch included Detective 307 and Batman 150:

 

 

An Adventures of the Jaguar and a Superboy or a World's Finest were also part of that first batch which soon ended up in the trash when my older sister convinced my mother that comics would surely corrupt me. And of course she was right. They have!

 

But my appetite for more comics had already been whetted by DC house ads such as these (although I haven't a clue as to where I first saw them):

 

 

 

Within a few months I was back to buying comics again and here I am today!

 

Edited May 14, 2013 by Hepcat

[Hepcat]

Here are my Aurora WWI airplane kits:

 

 

 

That's an Albatross in the top picture.

 

Given how many WWII plane kits I built as a kid, I have surprisingly few Aurora WWII model plane kits in my collection these days. Here they are:

 

 

 

 

[Mr_Peabody-migration]

It's so exasperating to constantly have to stress to the wait staff the importance of opening Grandma's Diner bright and early every morning!

 

 

 

[Unca Ben]

My newest best friend. This pics a few months old. She's bigger now.

 

[Hepcat]

Oh she's pretty!

 

[Bomber-Bob]

My first exposure to comics was in the comic section of the Saturday London Free Press in the late fifties. The Uncle Remus and his Tales of Brer Rabbit strip may have been the very first to capture my attention:

 

Within a few months I was back to buying comics again and here I am today!

 

 

Hep, great story, fun read. Thanks for sharing.