American Flyer Collectors Club
"The Collector"
Perhaps some of you who read the postings here remember the AFCC - The American Flyer Collectors Club. The club had an official publication called "The Collector" I became aware of the club and its newsletter/magazine in 1989 or 1990. I was busy collecting American Flyer S gauge at the time and I was really excited to find a national club and magazine devoted to American Flyer. I subscribed and had a subscription until the publication ended and I assume the club did too. Once I started getting "The Collector" I discovered that besides the S gauge trains that fascinated me there was a whole era of production of American Flyer Trains before WWII. I had a few submissions accepted and printed and I was delighted to have one of my photo submissions used as the cover for one issue.
Over the years I have acquired the entire run of "The Collector" and from time to time I dig them out and have a wonderful time reading. Members of the AFCC were encouraged to write articles and submit questions and photos. The list of contributors is a "Who's Who" of early train collectors. The information available in that little quarterly publication is amazing. I recommend it if you are interested in American Flyer and particularly if you enjoy the stories told by people who were there at the beginning. I have to admit that in some ways "The Collector" was my inspiration for starting a thread inviting others to post photos of Pre War American Flyer equipment.
Recently I was thumbing through some copies and I came across cartoons created by Bill Pirie. He also wrote a number of articles over the years and often created a cartoon to go along with the theme of the article. His first cartoon appeared in about 1981, I think in Volume 5 No. 1 of "The Collector".
I've done some searching on the internet but haven't been able to find out any information about him. Does anyone know anything about him; was he a cartoonist by trade? Is he someone that was well known in the train collecting community?
Greg
Northwoods Flyer
