Customer Reviews

Hot Rod Models (Enthusiast Color)

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1 star:		(1)

 

 

From the cover, with it's beautifully flamed 40 Ford coupe, Mooneyes dragster, and T-bucket roadster parked in front of vintage AMT and Revell model boxes, this book kept this modeler's rapt attention from cover to cover. You don't have to be a hot rodder to appreciate this effort either. Terry Jessee, an accomplished model builder himself, spoke with just about everybody ever involved in the history of the model car industry for some of the most informative insight you could possibly want. People like John Mueller, and George Toteff of AMT and MPC, Mark Gustavson, Dennis Doty, George Barris, and Ed "Big Daddy Roth". This book features a ton of illustrations ranging from vintage original artwork for the boxes, to a ton of beautifully built vintage hot rod models. Priced right around the same as a good model kit, this book is the best investment you'll make in quite some time! I guarantee you'll be opening this book time and time again. Run out and buy a copy for yourself, then run out and buy another, and donate it to the nearest school library!

Terry Jessee has done an excellent job of interviewing the top people of the best modeling companies in their heyday and capturing the excitement of the 60s and 70s car modeling. I'm a collector of over 240 vintage show rod kits and to read about both the designers and the executives of those companies was fascinating.

No hot rod modeling baby-boomer's library is complete without Hot Rod Model Kits!

Just recieved my copy of Hot Rod Model Kits and fell in love with it. Was really suprised to read the oldest review written here. The book has some great color photos of some of the best hot rod kits ever produced. It also has a great insite into the early years of model manufacturers. This book is devoted solely to car models unlike other books which try to cover everything and may fall short. It's not a price guide but rather a look into the history of hot rod modeling. An enjoyable trip to the past.

I've just read "Hot Rod Model Kits" by Terry Jessee. I thought it was a very informative and well written book. Granted it didn't have a story on everyone involved in Car Modeling, but that could only be done if the book was written in several volumnes.

The book brought back a lot of memories and answered a lot of questions that I had. I only got back into car modeling hobby about a year ago after about a twenty year layoff.Mr Jessee's book and articles in "Scale Auto Enthusiast Magazine" has made my come back much or enjoyable. THANKS TERRY !!

... this book is outstanding! No, it isn't filled with pictures of unassembled plastic parts in old boxes, nor is a comprehensive listing of every "hot rod" model kit ever produced. What it IS, though, is a very well-written, researched and illustrated history of hot rod models and the domestic model kit industry. The text is filled with amusing anecdotes about what the industry was like in the 1950s and 60s (the one about the popcorn had me in stitches!) and about how the model car kits we "boomers" loved as kids (and still love today) came into being. As I said, don't let a few uninformed comments deter you from buying this excellent book. If you have even a passing interest in the subject, you'll enjoy it, and if you're a model enthusiast, you'll devour it! Great job, Terry!

Something to consider--this book is NOT a collector's guide. It wasn't meant to be. Rather, as part of MBI's successful series of Enthusiasts' Color Galleries, the book is designed to be a nostalgic memory about the early days of the plastic model car hobby. What we did was interview John Mueller(AMT), Roger Harney (Monogram), Jim Keeler (Revell), and designers and R&D people from the companies to find out how the kits were conceived and designed. Then we talked with Don Emmons, and Keeler, and Bob Paeth, who wrote the articles for "Rod & Custom" and "Model Car Science" about building better hot rod models. And we interviewed Ed Roth and Tom Daniel and George Barris about their experiences with the model companies. Then some of the best model builders in the country contributed 80+ color photos of built examples of some of those old kits. This is a look back for kids whose car hobbies started with models in the '50s, '60s, and '70s. If you're looking for pictures of box art and unassembled parts, Rick Polizzi's "Classic Plastic" or Thomas Graham's "Greenberg Guides" are your source. If you want to remember the old days when you spent hours in your room or out in the garage building models and dreaming about cars you'd like to own, then this is your book. Where's the kits? We BUILT 'em, just like we did 40 years ago. This is not a book for collectors of unbuilt plastic kits. It's a book for guys who love cars.

Terry Jessee

This book is an insult to model lovers. According to the title this book should be about hot rod model kits so naturally I expected a book filled with examples of all the great hot rod kits of the last 40 years. Wrong! There is only a handfull of those while all the rest is stuff that should not even be in there like plain old stock cars, dragsters, funny cars and other non hot rods. Many,many pictures of built-ups. Once it is built it is not a kit anymore! Where are all the old classic hot rod kits? Just talking about them sure dosen't help much. Oh lots are mentioned but that just makes it worse when they are not shown! With over 40 years of fantastic rod kits and their fabulous artwork that should be displayed for the world to see-why so much nonrelated and new stuff? I want to SEE all those old kits but they are not here.What a disapointment. This is really a short history of the model companies but NOT a picture-book of hot rod model kits. For way more pictures of those you will have to get Classic Plastic model kits by Polizzi.The introduction is good though. Too bad someone decided not to do any homework or spend any time on finding the old kits and photographing them. The title of this book deserves better and so do we. Where are the hot rod kits?