I didn’t want this under the “modeling” topic because it would not be appropriate as it was built in China. I assume it is for our built models? I had posted about this in the “cool pix” and said it was assembled in Japan but the little tag that came with it says assembled in China. As I said before from the Franklin Mint. So I drove up two hours to Allentown today and purchased it from a friend who’s father was on the ship at the Surrender in 1945. He was in the U.S. Navy for three years and then worked for Mack Trucks Inc. in Allentown, Pennsylvania until he retired. He was a member of the USS Missouri Association. He passed away in 2013. The little anchor pin was his so I left it with the ship. Probably would have made for better photos but I chose to leave the top of the case on anyway. Deck painted blue as it was at that time.
Thank you, I don’t know much about these things or the whys and wherefores of these WWII ships, but I noticed that there was no name on the stern of the model and the top of the stacks not painted black, just the inside and when I saw on-line images from 1943 and 1944 of the Missouri and Iowa they are the same. So I guess they did the most accurate job they could when they assembled these models. Also, I couldn’t find out how many of these were produced for the Franklin Mint. Evidently they painted the stacks later?
Historically, the name, in raised letters, was there. However, during the war, the letters were painted the same color as the hull. At such, at this scale, they would be practically invisible. The black funnel caps was a post-WW2 color scheme.
No clue about the stacks on the models. I do remember drooling like an idiot in the Tamiya (SP?) stores in Japan. I have to admit that my most powerful non-combat memory of my time in the USN was walking down the pier at LBNSY with Missouri on one side and New Jersey on the other. They had their main batteries swung out over the pier and made a ... cathedral of the dock. I tried to get permission to photograph that but our CO* was not on board at the time. *I was on Peleliu LHA-5 at the time. I went TAD to Big Mo for three months before going to my next command.
Here is a good example of Missouri's stern in 1944. You can just barely make out the name on the stern.
