R.I.P. Wings and Airpower magazines

But you can still get them here: We are proud to announce that CHALLENGE PUBLICATIONS of Chatsworth, California, producers of AIR CLASSICS and WARBIRDS INTERNATIONAL Magazines will become the world's exclusive distributor for Wings & Airpower back issues and back issue Gift Sets.

sad. even though they got thinner and thinner and repeated much, they were still among the few.

glas i passed up the offers on my 70's issues. that was their golden age.

Now the values can climb on E-bay. Sorry to hear they're gone now as I really enjoyed the photography. Sometimes the articles were the only information I had on a type but I didn't always find the articles well written.

Bill Banaszak, MFE Sr.

My dad started getting them in 1973, I think when they started publication. I might be wrong about that, but it seems that's when they started. I picked up my own subscription for a while from 1986 to

So I've got stacks and stacks of the things. Well pawed over.

What I noticed over the years is that the articles were either about lesser and lesser significant types, or they were rehashes of already-covered types. Not a lot of really interesting stuff, in my opinion, that wasn't in older issues.

What I miss are the Wings of Fame... I got all of them, and they were brilliant.

---Stephen

Really? I collected these and got all up to and including Volume 20 when I got a letter from the publisher saying that they had decided to cancel the product and offering to move me onto AirPower instead.

I was quite annoyed at the time because I had invested quite a lot of money in the collection and thought it unfair that the publisher could simply decide he was going to complete it.

As for prices soaring on eBay. They might eventually but the first thing I noticed was that the publisher sold their stock to budget bookshops. A few weeks after the series had been pulled I could have bought all 20 volumes, brand new in a budget bookshop for £25. I think I had paid closer to £150.

Cheers,

Nigel

"Nigel Heather

Had the same experience with some of the auto books from Publications International Ltd. I could spend $34.95 plus tax at Border's or go down the lot to Ollie's and get them for $10 each. I now have the complete set of "Cars of..." and "100 Years of Ford".

Bill Banaszak, MFE Sr.

Just an aside, including the surprizing hard to find "Cars of the Sensational 70s"? Asking because late last year Borders AND Barnes & Noble more or less had a clearance sale on the other 4 books (that I know of ... 30s,

Yes, there were copies of that title there. Burned me up because I DID pay $34.95+tax for that one at Borders.

Bill Banaszak, MFE Sr.

"Mad-Modeller" wrote

Don't bet on it.

In the model railroad world there are two magazines that have been publishing since the 1930s. Guys get all misty about their collections and how these are the "greatest references you could have" and "my most valuable modeling tool". However, no one could provide me an answer as to why such a "valuable" thing could barely be given away at train shows and went begging on Ebay at fifty cents an issue - even with free postage. Through auctions and dealing with the seller directly I bought about 25 years worth for around $105 - and the seller spent $115 to mail them.

I discovered that about 70% of the magazine was advertising, layout tours (similar to reader galleries), or subjects that were no longer relevant, so by judicious use of a razor I was able to reduce a stack of magazines about

KL

I never gotten misty eyed at all about old issues of Model Railroader & RMC (the 2 founded in 1930s I presume you meant) - I mean they are moderately interesting to flip through, but certainly a lot of the modeling techniques & articles are now obsolete (because the materials used, or the base models, or the details are no longer offered, or because the once unavailable have-to-scratchbuild models are now offered everywhere, or because more or less the same article on weathering wooden structures has been re-written every 5 years, etc.. I'm not saying everything in them is irrelevant, but I usually clip about 2-3 articles (sometimes just a column which I scan into my computer, sometimes several pages) per issue nowadays - I guess that agrees with your magazine reduction ratio.

are ultra-rare or special (of course, most sellers think they are and set their reserve accordingly - not to mention the ol' extra-high shipping charges). Once in a while some (individual) seller gets lucky (maybe eBay stores do better), but man I wish I took advantage to get rid of old paperbacks when eBay was hopping and you could sell almost anything for a good price around the turn of the century...

ooks tend to be dogs on eBay unless they

I dunno, old copies of Air Trails (from the 1930s and 1940s) are running around $3-5 each, and some of the real old Popular Mechanics, Mechanix Illustrated and Popular Science are more than garage sale prices as well. ($3.00 as opposed to maybe 75=A2.

w and ap were somewhat like that. they have recycled pictures endlessly and a lot of atricles were re-used. as solid modeling references, they were about a c-.

"The Old Man" wrote

Even at double that price you aren't going to put your kid through college by selling them.

KL

There were two camps on the model RR bboard when I discussed this: Those who thought I was committing some sort of sacrilege by cutting up a 30-year-old magazine (*) and those who agreed that something was "worth" only what somebody would pay for it, supported by stories of how they literally couldn't give away their old mags and landfilled them instead.

The mags with a good bit of prototype content - RailModel Journal, Mainline Modeler (RIP) and Model Railroading (RIP) command a higher price than the more model oriented MR and RMC, but I wonder if that isn't due to scarcity as much as content. It seems from their annual USPS diclosures that none of these ever had a circulation or more than about 15,000, and RMJ is now down to about 5,000 - 7,500. At their peak in the 1980s MR was printing

(*) It was a magazine, not a book, and my property, not a library's.

KL

I reduced my MR collection in much the same way as I knew they weren't worth diddly on the market. I bought a lot of them for a quarter a piece at a small shop in the '80s. I did sell all of the Mainline Modellers and was particularly surprised to reap some reward from the few Narrow Gauge Gazettes that I had. What I'm in a quandary about is the Toy Train Collector mags. They seem too full of info to just trash but there has been no interest in the few I tried to E-bay.

Bill Banaszak, MFE Sr.

Heretic! Burn him! The villagers are marching up the mountain with torches and pitchforks...........oh, wait, it was just a magazine.........nevermind. Actually I'm seriously thinking of hacking up my old FSM's to get rid of the drivel and keep the few articles worth keeping. It's not like I don't have access to original documents in the genres I model or anything. Anyone know where to get 9" wide by 14" high binders?

Office Max? Staples? Office Depot?

Stephen "FPilot" Bierce/IPMS #35922 {Sig Quotes Removed on Request}

on 5/31/2007 1:40 AM Stephen Bierce said the following:

More than likely.