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I'm a retired Lieutenant Fire Fighter / EMT. Prior to working as a Firefighter, I also served in Law Enforcement for several years.

In following with our long line of family military service, dating all the way back to 1776, I'm a US Army veteran (tanker). I served mostly in the M-60A1 and eventually the M1-A1 series tanks. I was a crew member in the Abrams only for a short while.

My Dad was kind of like "Lt. Dan" from the movie Forrest Gump. Fortunately dear old Dad broke our "family curse" of having members killed in every major conflict that the United States has ever had. My Dad was wounded in the Korean War, and thankfully he was not killed. Otherwise I wouldn't be here if he was. I accidentally happened some years later...

My other hobbies include restoring old "Mopar" muscle cars from the late 1960's and early '70s. I also enjoy building aircraft in 1/48 & 1/32 scale, along with 1/35 Armor. I especially like the WW2 stuff. Lately I have been gravitating towards the First World War 1/32 scale aviation kits though...

I built my first model (Revell 1/32 P-40 "Flying Tigers" version) when I was 8 years old. I currently have about 700 kits ( of which about 1/4 are built).

It’s finally here ! ICM 1/48 scale Ki-21 “Sally” kit number 48195

This is a model that I have been waiting for every since I first heard about it becoming a reality. I pre ordered it from Squadron Mail Order when they announced it would be available for pre order purchase. The anticipation was great. [...]

Airfix 1/48 scale Curtiss P-40, 10th Air Base Squadron, Chanute Field, Illinois

This is a build that I had started a while ago. My very first model I built was the old 1/32 scale Revell P-40E "Flying Tigers" model. I was 8 years old. I was captivated by the box art, showing a P-40 diving through a [...]

1/48 scale Eduard FM-2 "Wilder Cat" kit number 11175 USS Nehenta Bay, VC-8 August 5th, 1945. Lt / JG O'Connor

When I first heard that Eduard was going to be releasing a brand new FM-2 Wildcat in 1/48 scale, I was very excited. I had the older Hobby Boss FM-2 kit, and it fell short in some areas. So I was not in any hurry to spend as much money [...]

1/48 Revell PV-1 Ventura, Bureau Number 34623, of VPB-145 at NAS Deland, July 29th, 1943

This true story is based on actual events that happened here at the Deland airport exactly 80 years ago today... on July 29th, 1943. I wanted to tell their story by writing this article, and building this PV-1 Ventura model, as a tribute [...]

Korean War Group is coming to a close soon....

Hello again everyone. This is a friendly reminder that the Korean War group will be closing soon. The last day to accept any new build journal entries will be on July 27th, 2023. So if you wanted to build something for the group, the [...]

Reminder: Korean War group Build is about to end.

The anniversary date for the "Cease Fire" on July 27th, 1953 is quickly coming up. Since we recently started the Jim Sullivan memorial group build, I mentioned that I would make some minor changes to the Korean War group. Here [...]

Jim Sullivan Memorial Group Build Started !

Hello everyone. This is a short note to let you know it's official. Our website owner / admin Martin (the wonderful fellow who has made Imodeler possible), has kindly given permission for us to have this brand new group build, held in [...]

A Modest Proposal: for a New group build, in Jim Sullivan's Honor

Hello again everyone. Most of you will know by now that we recently lost a great person, and fellow Imodeler who was also a well known and accomplished author. Topping this off, Jim was very passionate model builder too. Jim Sullivan [...]

Korean War Group Update: Reminder, it will end on July 27th, 2023

Hello again everyone. This is just a friendly reminder to let you know that our highly successful Korean War Group will come to a close in late July. This group followed the actual dates of the so called "Police Action", which [...]

1st LT Walter "Tiger" Thomas Mayberry, USMC Reserve, VMF-123 F4U-1 "Birdcage" Corsair Bureau Number 02351, March, 4th, 1944 Tunnel Hill Massacre near Rabaul Tamiya 1/48 Corsair

This is a true story about one of our local hometown "Daytona Beach" men, who went to War, and never made it back home. His name was Walter Mayberry. He was a very gifted and talented "American" football player (not [...]