E. L. Moore's Molasses Mine is one of life's conundrums. I'll never understand what they were thinking at AHM that made them decide to immortalize it in a kit. Although, I'm glad they did. Martin sent me this photo of IHC's boxing. You can see they've taken all the fun out of it. At least when AHM reboxed the thing it became the Kaboom Powder Factory, which is certainly keeping to the Moorian spirit of the model. IHC stripped the life out of it by drearily renaming it Chemical Processing Plant, and adding an equally bland company name in brackets, American Reagent Company, in case there was any residual fun left. If, dear reader, you are the one who now owns the molds to this classic product, I beseech you to consider the name Cousin Cal's Chemicals as a starting point for any new releases :-)
And if that wasn't enough they slapped on some rather crudely made signs to emphasize the kit's brave new reality. Over there is the kit's sign sheet. My inner word-nerd gags at the 'No Trespass' sign, and the word DANGER written in green type - talk about mixed messages. And don't get me started on those box-top colours. They're enough to dangerously mix up my digester :-)
I was rummaging around the internet and came across Algorithma's Colorization page. I've wanted to try colourizing E. L. Moore's old photos so I gave it a try with some scans of his old B&W photos. Over there shows how the algorithm colourized the Molasses Mine. And down below is my photo of the Molasses Mine when I saw it up close and personal.
The colourization doesn't look too bad if one doesn't know what the original looked like. Although, it makes me wonder if the algorithm could be calibrated using photos of the actual models, maybe it could colourize the old, E. L. Moore photos to a state more like they actually were. Another thing I need to look into.
While I was searching for Machine Shop box variations I came across this version of the Molasses Mine kit. The so-called Kaboom Powder Factory version by AHM doesn't look like it has had any modifications done to it other than a name change and re-boxing. What made this box particularly interesting to me was this P.S. I found in a letter dated July 13, 1971 from E. L. Moore to Denis Dunning, the managing editor of Railroad Modeler magazine: Peter Van Dore of AHM sayn[sic] they're working on another model of mine -- they have three now listed -- and asked me to make one specifically for them. A dynamite plant with one side blown off. That's the only reference E. L. Moore made to creating an exclusive model for AHM. And there are no other references to him making an AHM Dynamite Plant. But, maybe the idea of a kabooming dynamite plant stuck with Mr. van Dore, or someone else at AHM, and simply renaming the already weird Molasses Mine was the way to produce such a plant on the cheap and easy. E. L. Moore didn't let the idea of a dynamite plant sink. His article, The Cannonball & Safety Powder Works, where he infamously blew up the finished model at the end of the story, was submitted to Model Railroader on 10 April 1974, and was published there in the April 1977 issue. When was AHM's Kaboom Powder Factory first released? I have no idea, but I can see many happy hours of investigation ahead :-)
This post got its start in the same way a lot of others have: an interesting discussion with Vince. Well, ok, there was also another reason. The Art Curren post got me thinking that cheap and cheerful kits once had a place in the hobby. Some people bought the kits, built them as intended with varying degrees of skill, and put them on their layouts, but others, like Mr. Curren, used them as convenience items for kitbashing structures that were more to their own liking. And his preference, if his "Stratchbuilding"-with plastic kit walls in the June 1977 issue of Railroad Model Craftsman is anything to go by, was for the readily available E. L. Moore plastic kits that had been on the market for a number of years by that time.
At this blog I've built a few of those E. L. Moore kits, but more from the straight out-of-the-box perspective, than with a kitbashing intent. They aren't the most high fidelity kits, but with a little work, they can be rather attractive. My first builds here at 30 Squares - Ma's Place and Speedy Andrew's - were the subject of this 3 part series: Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.
What got Vince and me talking was that as well as the kits directly made from Mr. Moore's RMC articles, there's a whole other set of cousin kits that were manufactured based on the parts from the original 9 (there's a list of The Original 9 over at my Wikipedia article). Speedy Andrew's over there - really, an auto repair garage, not a surf shop - is one. You can see it's based on Ma's Place. I think it would be quite a lengthy investigation to track down the entire lineage of kits as the molds have changed owners, and the kits have gone in and out of production over the years.
It turns out, unbeknownst to me at the time, I did buy and build a couple of E. L. Moore kits back in the '70s. Ok, I knew I bought the kits, but I didn't know who designed them :-) That one is the Ramsey Journal Building that I tried to convert to a Home Hardware. A lot of the parts are now missing, but it was a semi-sensible conversion, although very basic on execution.
A couple of years back I bought this kit at a swap meet with an eye towards getting the parts I needed to restore my Home Hardware. I think I paid a loonie for it. You can see the indications on the AHM kit that this was designed by E. L. Moore are long gone on this Tyco version.
Good thing I didn't pay too much, because it looks like the original owner took Art Curren's advice to heart and used the walls to build something else. Luckily, the walls are what I have, and it's the other parts I need.
Also back in the '70s I built E. L. Moore's Village Smithy kit. And, again, back then I didn't know about the E. L. Moore connection. I think somewhere along the line I cannibalized the kit to make something else, hence the missing parts.
I have bought a few more E. L. Moore kits in this century. Over there is the W. E. Snatchem Funeral Parlor which interestingly enough, the manufacturer left the W off the sign, so no one will get the joke if they're not in-the-know - like you are :-)
But, the rest of the kits I've bought over the last few years are still in boxes. That one is the sister project to W. E. Snatchem: The Grusom Casket Co. That one apparently was for the German market because those red boxes announcing the kit was designed by E. L. Moore are in German.
I bought that AHM version of Grusom's because this Pola version I bought about 6 months earlier didn't have all the walls - half were missing. I didn't check the kit when I bought it, so my fault. Once again, someone was using the kit's parts to make something else a la the Art Curren philosophy :-)
Finally, I have this kit of E. L. Moore's Schaefer Brewery - retitled by Model Power - awaiting my acquisition of a second so I can build Art Curren's Perry Shibbel Fruit & Produce Co-Op that you can find in his 1988 book, Kitbashing HO Model Railroad Structures. I've studied the plans a bit, and it turns out I think Shibbel's could be built from a single kit with a strategic substitution of styrene brick sheets here-and-there.
Even from this small selection of E. L. Moore designed kits, you can see the masters have been owned by a few companies over the years, so compiling a list of them all, and their derivatives, would be challenging.
What did Phil Spector and Art Curren have in common?
One had a wall of sound and the other made miniature buildings from plastic walls.
What did Phil Spector and Art Curren not have in common?
One was heavily influenced by E. L. Moore and the other - it's pretty safe to say - wasn't.
Thank you E. L. Moore for the design and AHM or Tyco for the material.
Art Curren's conclusion to "Scratchbuilding" - with plastic kit walls in the June '77 issue of Railroad Model Craftsman
Galen hinted that had Art Curren participated in the plastic models conversation, he would have had a different, and more positive take on Bob Hegge's assertion that many builders are not too fond of plastic products :-) Mr. Curren is well known for using plastic kits of miniature buildings as parts for building more interesting structures of his own design - call it kit-mingling, kitbashing, or kit-scratching, take your pick.
For the longest time I thought Art Curren had always been a staffer at Model Railroader, but it turns out he didn't join the magazine until July 1978. Up until then he was also a prolific author over at Railroad Model Craftsman. I did some digging in RMC, and I think this list covers what he published there (please let me know if something is missing).
Jan '75: RMC / Dremel Kitbashing Award: Coal Bunker and Freight House July '75: Color signs from black and white dry transfers
Oct '75: Walls of Ivy
Jan '76: Buildings on the bias
Apr '76: Detail parts from diesel shells
June '76: Watts in a naim
Nov '76: Back to nature for dead trees
Dec '76: Kitbashing Frenda Mill, Part 1
Jan '77: Kitbashing Frenda Mill, Part 2
Feb '77: A variety of vents
Apr '77: Building the buildings that aren't
June '77: "Scratchbuilding" - with plastic kit walls
Nov '77: A lot of industry in a small space
Feb '78: Frenda Mines II, III and IV (see also Don McFall's Friend of Frenda Mill in the same issue)
June '78: The Twin-Cities Concept
Sept '78: Griffin & Howe: An example of over-the-tracks space utilization.
Most notable to me was that June '77 story, "Scratchbuilding" - with plastic kit walls, as I think it does the best job of summarizing his philosophy that plastic kits of miniature buildings can be viewed as raw materials instead of just parts to assemble a predefined model: The walls of the aforementioned plastic kits (and many other plastic kits, too) are to me as much building material as are structural shapes, stripwood, sheetwood, plastic sheetstock, yardstick, or other commonly used materials.
And the plastic kits he says he found the most useful were those E. L. Moore kits produced by AHM and Tyco, especially the Ramsey Journal building, the Gruesom Casket company, and their derivatives, the firehouse and rooming house. He also mentioned uses for the Molasses Mine.
The number of models with detachable roofs is surprising. Not all interiors were detailed, but many were finished to a degree that would allow for later detailing. I sometimes wonder why he went to all that effort to make a clean interior, but never got around to detailing it.
