Italeri 1/35 80' Elco PT Boat 596

Growing up in Rhode Island at a young age I knew what a PT Boat was; especially famous one's like Kennedy's PT 109.  This is because the 1st and only training facility for PT Boat skippers and crews was in Melville, RI part of the town Portsmouth, RI.  This is only a few miles from the much larger Newport, Naval Station also in Rhode Island best known for the Naval War College and the site of the Navy's Officer Candidate School.  My dad was a WW2 Navy veteran and knew the history of the PT Boat, as well as, the story of Melville, very well.  So every time we passed through this part of RI it was mentioned, and discussed and I was well taught this history at a very young age.  

Also, located apx 20 minutes from my house, was the world renown "Battleship Cove Museum"; this was home of the USS Massachusetts Battleship museum, several other war ship museums, and the best PT Boat museum in the country.  This museum actually houses the PT 596 80' Elco used to help Italeri plan and design this model.  The instruction booklets included with the kit have actual pictures of the PT 596 as it currently looks and preserved at this museum, and the model exactly emulates it's current museum fit.  

So, you can now appreciate my need and desire to build a model like this especially when a 1/35 3 for model of it was released.  This was an outstanding kit and the biggest of it's kind regarding plastic scale models goes.  This was the King-Cong of Naval plastic models and I had a really good time reconstructing this fine fighting machine which was kept only a few miles from my home, past and present.  I purchased it as soon as it was released and could not wait to get started.  I finished the basic model then not having a good safe place to store it I put it in the basement were it collected a lot of dust for several years.  It was in awful condition as well as I never felt completely satisfied with the outcome especially considered I had grown as an advanced modeler while it sat beached in the basement.  So one day I said I need to preserve it and tried to acquire some sort of storage device to save it.  I ended up putting it in a very large rubber, airtight container, were it still sits.  But before I did this I decided to bring the model up to my more advanced modeling standards so I again had some fun working on it giving it a complete re-fit, taking it apart, repainting parts, attaching crew figures, and weathering it.  Now I am much more happy with the outcome although not perfect.  You see they had not released any after-market accessories for this boat when it was released until many years later.  This is especially true for an appropriate crew.  So I had to purchase a 1/35 crew kit for a different type of boat.  I believe it was for a Navy LST landing craft in same scale.  Of coarse now they have tons of after market stuff for this kit, as well as, an appropriate PT Boat Crew kit.  They even re-released the kit with parts to convert it to Kennedy's PT-109.  Maybe I will build the whole kit from scratch some day.....or NOT...LOL!

In closing, I am still bummed that this museum quality model does not have a proper display case, or even a location to display it.  House is just to crowded and I am lucky to display my smaller models in the house due to wife's generous appreciation of my hobby, but I can't push it to get this one set up in the living room or dining room.  So it sits in a rubber tub.  But at least it's safe.  If you happen to be reading this and know of a museum, and/or organization, that could appreciate this model and would want to display it properly please contact me at "paulmoira@verizon.net".  Hope you enjoy the photo's.