I *wish* I could collect pipe organs! I've always enjoyed theater organs, and I've observed that many steam railroading fans do as well. The legendary Cliff Lusher of Accucraft had a job for many years installing and tuning/repairing theater organs.

I have a nickelodeon, a jukebox and several arcade games (pinball, skee ball, video games, etc.) I'd like to pick up a 1910/1920's fire engine at some point.

Oh, to Steve's point, I also collect rust. I have lots of that!

I collect:
RR items, mostly relating to the East Tennessee & Western North Carolina RR (the "Tweetsie)
Sci-fi uniforms and weapons from TV shows and movies: http://www.freewebs.com/willysmb44/scifi.htm
US WW2 uniforms, weapons and equipment (I have a WW2 Jeep in the garage)

WW2 war correspondent items and uniforms http://www.freewebs.com/willysmb44/warco.htm
Anything related to WW2 cartoonist Bill Mauldin

Oh, I don't collect anything near that nice. I collect dive and dive style watches. My current collection consists of Casio, Invicta, and Seiko watches.

I really lust after a Rolex Submariner and an Omega Seamaster, but I don't want to pay the steep prices for them.

Forgot this was on flickr.



I also would like to get a fire truck but from the 50's!

I don't now if I'm a collector, or a hoarder, but I love Lego. I have all of the Pirates of the Caribbean sets, with the two pirate ships on display with another pirate ship, Brickbeard's Bounty, and the Imperial Flagship. My wife seems to support my habit, she recently started getting me the sets from the Monsters line. I look at some of the sets as models, which I can have fun with. On Brickbeard's Bounty (my first ship), I put little "Easter eggs", like a rowboat full of sailors (in the traditional white uniform) climbing on-board for duty and an Eskimo fishing off the back (he snagged a large shark). I also have the Emerald Night train, the only thing I did with that was put the old west outlaw on board robbing the train. If I can get the time (and the funds released from the CFO), I want to build some more cars for the Emerald Night, such as a combine and put it on some tracks.

Normally, I hate Lego - mainly because of the visible assembly studs, and blocky form approximations. I have noticed that some kits minimize the studs on the finished model, and have enough special parts to render a fairly good likeness of the subject. The Emerald Night train is nice enough to almost win me over. Another thing I like are robust models. I would think that, if this train's parts were well-cemented, the model should be very strong - much more so, than a typical kit-built plastic scale model.

I also like die cast car models. At some points, it's gotten to the collecting level, such that I would be at local Walmarts, Targets, Kaybees and Toys-R-Uses in the morning, when the store opened - in order to get first shot at the most desirable Hot Wheels, etc. In these parts, there are lots of guys who do similarly, and the pre-opening chat is very interesting.

I love Mallory's books. For me personally the two West Side lumber books are my fav. out of most my books. If you don't already have it I would recommend Railroads in the Woods John Labbe, Vetnon Goe, publisher Oso. Great great photos of everything logging related. I dont think amazon is the best price though. Picked mine up with tax for $38 at local train shop.


http://www.amazon.com/Railroads-Woods-J ... +the+woods

As a big time ET&WNC fan, I did too, until I heard recently that he schmoozed some photos from the collection of an old (now deceased) ET&WNC employee to 'borrow' them for the book, but never returned them. Been ticked about that ever since I heard it. Still, it wasn't enough to make me get ride of my copies of Tweetsie Country and his Sumpter Valley book...

I am another US military collector with 2 USMC WWII jeeps a Holden ambulance and a MZ/NOM 12 radio jeep, a WC 9 ambulance, WC 12 closed cab truck, M3a4 handcart, 2 K38 telephone trailers, and a few other things. I also have a bunch of stuff siting in a museum