General Jumbo - The Great Reveal!
Posted: Mon Dec 17, 2018 8:10 pm
I've been pondering what to do for some time. You see, do l tell you the truth or keep quiet and allow the legend to go on? But no - you are all my friends and have a right to know what really happened.
Shortly after WW2, my great grand father on my mum's father's side, a Mr Eric Swivel of Scunthorpe and his best mate from school, Nigel Grommet, decided to build a scale army. Nigel was very good with his hands and did well in physics classes so was put in charge of building and Eric, not the brightest in town, was left to 'organise things'. They raised funds by each doing 6 paper rounds and with a bit of help from the local corner oil shop were able to source what they needed.
Once started, things got out if hand (we all know that problem!) and what started as a wish to build a tank or two quickly grew to a full sized army, navy and airforce but in a smaller scale - around 1/15th (yet another standard....). But how were they to control a 100+ force?
By radio control of course but there was a problem. All that was available then was remote cable control and that just wouldn't cut the mustard. Now - we all assumed they somehow found a way of creating RC and not just any old RC, but an RC system that controlled dozens of vehicles at the same time, concurrently even! But didn't they rely on a friendly professor to do this? No, this was just a myth. And now the big reveal.......
THE RADIO WRIST COLLAR WORN BY ERIC WAS NOTHING MORE THAN A SIMPLE SHORT WAVE RADIO!
Yes, its true. It was just a sort of walkie talkie. So how did Eric control the vehicles? You have to remember that Eric and Nigel were just young teenagers and building fully working scale models was really stretching them. No, they relied on each vehicle being driven, flown, sailed by.....
Simple scale service men. Eric gave his orders over the short wave radio and intelligent scale robots dressed in service uniforms handled their vehicles as commands by Eric. So as you can see, General Jumbo's miniature forces were not the technological marvel they allowed people to think they were!
Their local fame led to the Beano comic fictionalising their adventures but, sadly, that is no more. Though Eric and Nigel are long gone, their vehicles complete with robots are still existing, mothballed in a barn just off the B7067 near Grottbury Pavers but unfortunatley, given the rising costs of paying a minimum wage to all 1500 robots and the pending impact of Brexit, it is unlikely that the famous army will ever again see the light of day.
So there you are, the secret is out and l feel much better for getting the family secret off my chest. I trust you'll think no less of me, were that possible
Sent from my ASUS_T00G using Tapatalk
Shortly after WW2, my great grand father on my mum's father's side, a Mr Eric Swivel of Scunthorpe and his best mate from school, Nigel Grommet, decided to build a scale army. Nigel was very good with his hands and did well in physics classes so was put in charge of building and Eric, not the brightest in town, was left to 'organise things'. They raised funds by each doing 6 paper rounds and with a bit of help from the local corner oil shop were able to source what they needed.
Once started, things got out if hand (we all know that problem!) and what started as a wish to build a tank or two quickly grew to a full sized army, navy and airforce but in a smaller scale - around 1/15th (yet another standard....). But how were they to control a 100+ force?
By radio control of course but there was a problem. All that was available then was remote cable control and that just wouldn't cut the mustard. Now - we all assumed they somehow found a way of creating RC and not just any old RC, but an RC system that controlled dozens of vehicles at the same time, concurrently even! But didn't they rely on a friendly professor to do this? No, this was just a myth. And now the big reveal.......
THE RADIO WRIST COLLAR WORN BY ERIC WAS NOTHING MORE THAN A SIMPLE SHORT WAVE RADIO!
Yes, its true. It was just a sort of walkie talkie. So how did Eric control the vehicles? You have to remember that Eric and Nigel were just young teenagers and building fully working scale models was really stretching them. No, they relied on each vehicle being driven, flown, sailed by.....
Simple scale service men. Eric gave his orders over the short wave radio and intelligent scale robots dressed in service uniforms handled their vehicles as commands by Eric. So as you can see, General Jumbo's miniature forces were not the technological marvel they allowed people to think they were!
Their local fame led to the Beano comic fictionalising their adventures but, sadly, that is no more. Though Eric and Nigel are long gone, their vehicles complete with robots are still existing, mothballed in a barn just off the B7067 near Grottbury Pavers but unfortunatley, given the rising costs of paying a minimum wage to all 1500 robots and the pending impact of Brexit, it is unlikely that the famous army will ever again see the light of day.
So there you are, the secret is out and l feel much better for getting the family secret off my chest. I trust you'll think no less of me, were that possible
Sent from my ASUS_T00G using Tapatalk