Found something I've been waiting a LONG time to find.......

Well, I finally obtained something that I have pined for for many years, never thought it would happen.

Some of you may know that my dad served on the Fanshaw Bay, CVE-70 during WWII. Among others (including the invasion of Okinawa) he was involved in the Battle off Samar (Bosamar.com). I was able to make him some scale models (1/48) of the planes that operated from his carrier. BUT I was never able to find a model of his ship. There was a model of the Gambier Bay (CVE-73) which my dad saw sink during that battle from Japanese cruiser fire, but that model cost over 250 bucks at that time (some ten or more years ago, price went up...) and has not been available since before Dad passed in December of 2006.

Today I struck gold. I happened to find this model: http://www.squadron.com/NoStock.asp?item=HE40027

I actually bought it for just less than 100 bucks from another site. This model could be considered a sister ship to my dad's, so I'm going to build her as the Fanny Bee. I have many pictures and mementos of my dad's to use as reference.

If only he could see it when I get done with it.

tom

 

Tom,

A very nice post. Glad you were successful in finding a model to resemble the Fanshaw Bay. Good that you have such great mementos from your dad to help you with the model. My dad served on the Kitkun Bay, also involved in the Battle off Samar. He passed away in 1997. I wish Forums such as these were around before he died. He would have loved this. Hope you'll post some photos of the Fanny Bee when you get her finished! I'm sure your dad would be proud.

 

It will take a while, but I sure will. It's nice to know there are others with family connections to Taffy 3. Many of the photos of the BOS were taken aboard the Kitkun Bay. Do you have any of the original Navy books associated with the escort carriers? I have The Escort Carriers In Action and Straddled, a short history of the Fanshaw Bay. I salute your dad and your carrying on his and his shipmates' memory.

tom

 

Beings what I was able to see were 'Up Deatiling kits' does that mean you have to find a hull of your own to use? That would be in keeping with the CVE's.

 

Hah, CVE's certainly were minimally engineered stopgap ships, for sure.

The kit does come with a hull and I'm going to build it "out of the box". The "Up detailing kits" are a bit pricey for me and buying all of them could more than double the original kit cost.

tom

 

They do seem a bit spendy; not hard to imagine they would cause the budget to skyrocket......good luck and post pics

 

Thanks for the salute. It's important to keep these memories alive. Unfortunately, I don't have any of the books associated with the escort carriers. Do you have photos from your dad's service on the Fanshaw Bay? Have you posted them on the forum and I just haven't found them? When I can find the time, I hope to collect some of my dad's photos and digitize them. Maybe I'll post a few if/when I get around to doing that!

 

Well done Tom! Please keep us posted as you reconfigure and build it!

 

I ordered the paint for the model. I have a lot of paint on hand already, but I ordered all of the paint for the kit by the Mr.Color number. That, my friends, is just short of 50 bucks worth of paint........

It will be quite a while before I start on this model. I'm less than halfway through the Accurate Minatures (reboxed Eduard) FW-190A-8 "Priller" 1/48 scale. I get maybe 10 minutes a day to work on my models.

tom