Annual fundraiser for Scouts to feature miniature trains, planes and slot cars
There was the year someone brought a seven-foot-long submarine, complete with working torpedoes.
“Put it in the pool!” people yelled, so they did, and about 600 people crammed into the indoor pool at the high school to see the radiocontrolled sub prowl around. The one lifeguard on duty freaked out because there “were some crowd control issues,” organizer Didier Piette said.
“We never did that again.” Or the year someone brought their eight-foot-long, radio-controlled model jet, complete with miniature jet engine, that can propel the model plane at speeds up to 400 kilometres an hour.
“They ’re expensive,” Piette said. “Like $15,000 to $20,000. And that’s just for the engine. That doesn’t include the plane.”
They took it out to the parking lot just to hear it fire up.
“It sounds like an actual jet — it’s that loud,” Piette said. “There were like 1,000 people who came out to see it. It was on for 15 seconds — didn’t even fly.
“People are still talking about that.”
This weekend, for the 22nd year in a row, the Groupe Scouts 10e St Christophe de Laval will hold their biannual Quebec Hobby Show. It’s the largest in the province, taking up 26,000 square feet of floor space at the Georges-Vanier High School in Laval. It draws more than 600 presenters, and anywhere from 4,000 to 8,000 spectators over two days, who gawk at model train sets and try out slot-track car races or radio-controlled helicopters and dirt buggies. Multitudes of plastic models and die-cast miniature metal cars are on display.
Amateurs can get tips on anything from how to make realistic rocks on a mountain range to different ways to make a freight car look rusted out.
“I’d rather see my kids play with a model train on a piece of wood than sitting in front of a TV screen from morning to night,” said Piette, the show organizer. “When you’re pushing your thumb on a joystick, you’re not creating anything. When you’re building a house or a toy car, it’s working a lot more of your brain.”
The elites of the modelling world will be in attendance, displaying Napoleonic-era warships crafted entirely of wood, or, in the case of one Italian former navy man, a perfect likeness of the destroyer
he once served on; it took 2,000 hours to build.
Serious collectors can get in an hour early (for an extra $10) to find deals on limited edition trains or Matchbox cars — or whatever their passion is — that stores no longer stock. Locomotives that sell new for $150 can be had for as low as $80, with no tax, Piette said. They’re pre-owned, but tend to have lived a pampered existence. A large-scale model of a Union Pacific Big Boy steam engine sold for $2,700 a few years back.
Born as a novel way to raise money for scouting from parents tired of selling calendars or cookies, the fundraiser has grown from 90 display tables in 1996 to more than 600 today. Once a staple at Place Bonaventure in downtown Montreal, large-scale hobby shows were phased out in the early 1990s. Overshadowed by the video game culture and no longer the headliners in toy store displays, models and hobbies are having a harder time these days. Most of the crowd are men over 40. Items that move, like train sets and slot cars and remote-controlled vehicles, remain the crowd favourites.
Hope for resurgence comes in the number of fathers who are bringing their kids to see the Matchbox cars of their youth (which sold for 39 cents in the late 1960s and can fetch up to $300 today for one in mint condition), and the bendy orange plastic tracks kids use to race them in. Or the train sets, or slot-car race sets.
“It brings you back to your childhood — you see toys you haven’t seen in 40 years,” Piette said. “We see the father with their two young kids, and you look in his eyes and you know he’s happy because he convinced his wife to let him pay $200 on a slot-car starter kit.
“And you know it’s him who is going home to play with it.”
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CUMMINGS, Dr. Ina Ethel 1939 – 2018 After a long illness, Ina passed away on March 20, 2018. She was the eldest daughter of the late Stanley Cummings and the late Kathleen Laberee Cummings, of Sawyerville, Quebec. She is survived by her two sons Krikor and Stanley Ajemian, grandson Paxton, and sister Reta Goodfellow (Angus Goodfellow). She will also be remembered by the larger family of nephews, cousins, and in-laws, as well as by many friends, particularly longtime companion Elisabeth Janssen. Ina received scholarships to Bishop’s University (graduating in 1960) and McGill University medical school (graduating in 1964). She began her medical career in family practice, but early on developed an interest in palliative care. Starting in the 1970s, she worked with Dr. Balfour Mount to set up the palliative care ward at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Montreal. In 1993 she moved to Halifax to take charge of palliative care services for the province of Nova Scotia. She returned to Montreal’s West Island in 1999, where she was one of the founders of the West Island Palliative Care Residence. Ina helped found the Canadian Hospice Palliative Care Association, which honoured her with an award of excellence in 1997. She was also a founding member of the Canadian Society of Palliative Care Physicians, which honoured her with its Lifetime Achievement Award in 2016. In addition to her medical career, she was very active in the church. She served for many years as an elder and congregational companion for the Presbyterian Church of St. Columba by-the-Lake in Pointe-Claire, Quebec. In what spare time she had, she enjoyed making several crafts, such as stained glass and quilting. Those who knew Ina will always remember her amazing generosity of spirit. The family wishes to thank the staff at West Island Palliative Care Residence where, coming full circle, she returned to spend her last days. A memorial service to celebrate Ina’s life will be held at 2 p.m. on Monday, April 2, 2018 at the Presbyterian Church of St. Columba by-the-Lake, 11 Rodney Avenue, Pointe-Claire, QC, H9R 4L8, followed by a reception at the church. In lieu of flowers, donations in Ina’s memory to organizations that were dear to her would be appreciated: The West Island Palliative Care Residence Foundation, The Presbyterian Church of St. Columba by-the-Lake, The St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Homes Foundation. Funeral arrangements entrusted to Voluntas (514-695-7979, 