Fortuitous Find – 4/25/2020
A few months ago before COVID settled in, I was wandering through a local Goodwill on my lunch break. I was passing by the toy section when this old armored war wagon caught my eye. She had been assembled rather well but not painted or decaled. She’d also been ridden hard and put away wet. Two of her bogie wheel assemblies were missing along with the turret’s 50 cal machine gun, hatch and several other small parts. Oddly enough the commander was still there, jiggling around in the now permanently open hatch (he’s actually surprisingly hard to remove). Also a bit of luck was the presence of both treads. I flipped her over, $1.00. What the heck right?
Second thoughts
I started walking to the checkout, trophy in hand, then felt guilty and dumb at the same time. What if some young version of me saw this for a buck? I’d have been all over my mom trying to get her to buy it. Also what were the odds I’d ever get around to actually doing anything with it? Sure I could design some replacement Bogies, a hatch and a new 50 cal, then 3D print the lot, but would I? I reversed the ten steps I’d taken towards the checkout and placed the old M4 back on the shelf.
Second Chance
Lunch time, thee or four days latter. Again wandering through Goodwill. I walked by the toy section to confirm that the Sherman was gone but there she was, looking worse for wear. She’d taken more battle damage, another bogie assembly, a tread and her hull nose piece were now gone. I felt she was junk now and that I should have picked her up earlier… Then I spotted the wayward tread on a lower shelf, the newly missing bogies nearby. I widened my search and miraculously spotted the nose piece on the floor about 20 feet away.
Fate had spoken loud and clear: “Save this Sherman!”
Epilogue
Sure enough, I kind’a forgot about the Sherman. I was busy making my 1/450 scale warship armada. However, one day while perusing free downloads on sketchfab.com, I spotted a collection of low detail tank and half-track models, both US and German. They were intended for use as war-gaming miniatures but were the catalyst I needed to shut down the shipyards for a bit and for the first time in 40+ years, try my hand at some armor. That lead to my German Panther project. Realizing with just a bit more work I could give the Panther an in scale foe, I actually did something with the rescued Goodwill M4 Sherman.
I research the model when I got it home and confirmed my suspicions, it was indeed an old Revell kit. I added the box art picture to the gallery so you’d know which kit it originally was. No before shots exist because initially I didn’t think it would be worth posting. Now I feel bad about that as I kind’a like how the restoration turned out.
Wow nice job!