Crapolafrom theCupolaJohn C. SmithPecos River BrassChapter IVWhich factory in Seoul should Ichose? That was the question of theyear. They all wanted my business.They were all the best. They all promisedto make me big profits. I had samplesfrom every factory and they wereall reject overruns.Then one of the courting builderscalled me and informed me that he wascoming to the USA and wanted to visitwith me in Texas. I never say never. Ofcourse, I would pick him up, be a greathost, and see what he had to show andtell. His name was Jun, Young Sik(Korean names are always surnamefirst) and the company was GangSanModel Co. I asked my mechanic anddraftsman to be with me when we methim and we were impressed. I guess wewere overwhelmed and impressed withourselves, playing in the big game, butnevertheless impressed.We had a great meeting. We askedlots of questions. His English was betterthan most Texan’s so communicationwas not a problem. He was friendly, andloose. We felt very comfortable from thebeginning. GangSan was a new companythat Jim Findley did not know aboutand did not tell me about. Three teamleaders who worked for Dong Jin decidedto go out on their own and start acompany. They were Lee, Ho Chul,Park, Nam Il, and a Mr. An. They hadthe desire to produce, but were tiredworking for Mr. Park of Dong Jin.(Dong Jin and DaiYoung were twocompanies from the 1970s run by brothers.I believe that neither are still in thebusiness.)Ho Chul Lee was the leader of thethree and went to Young Sik Jun tofinance the company. Jun already had abrass company and produced andexported brass picture frames and brassstatues of animals, among other thingsfor Korean sales and export to placeslike Pier One. Jun agreed to finance thenew adventure. With the existing factory,knowledge of the export trade andfluency in English, he was perfect. Hewas already working for GHB, Sunsetand Precision Scale when I started withthe firm. They had about 50 employees.During the 1980s, Samhongsa wasKing with about 500 employees. In1980, when I worked for Hallmark,both Bobbye Hall and Tom Marsh ofOverland Models worked with DongJin and Ajin. At about that time, Hallmarkdropped Ajin, and Overlanddropped Dong Jin, and that is when thelong empire of Overland and Ajin startedto gain momentum. Ajin soonbecame the second biggest factory inKorea, but I do not know how manypeople he employed.There were several other factoriesthen of about 50-100 employees,including FM, GangSan, DaiYoung,Dong Jin, M.S. Park, and ROK-AM,started by a joint partnership between aKorean (ROK) and an American,Richard Sharland (AM). Richard Sharlandowned several discos and Country& Western bars catering to AmericanGIs in Seoul. The model building venturewas just a sideline. There were alsomany very small companies of 10-20people and a number of subcontractorsthat did nothing but wheel sets, etching,casting, stamping, and other things allnecessary to the brass process. Most ofthe big companies were self contained.Despite the fact that I didn’t want todo any reruns of other people’s projects,Pecos River Brass’s first projectwith Gang San Model Company was aSanta Fe wood caboose. Of course, mylogic was that I wanted the caboose inO and N <strong>scale</strong> where it had neverbefore been done, but while there,doing it in HO at the same time. It wasa sellout in all three <strong>scale</strong>s. My firstpainted model came in then in O Scalebut without lettering.I next went on with the traditionestablished and produced a Santa FeStock car series of Sk-Q, Sk-R, Sk-S,Sk-T and Sk-U in HO, O and N Scales.They were painted in O and N Scale. InHO and O Scale, they were a sellout. InN Scale, well I don’t know if brass N<strong>scale</strong> cars were ahead of their time, oroverpriced, or undersold, or overbuilt,or WHAT. I should have seen the writingon the wall for N Scale and PRBthen, but I was determined. I had a handfull of very supportive customers whowere buying 25-40 of every freight car Idid. I didn’t have enough customers,and I just never learned what made NScale dealers tick.Everything was going well for PecosRiver Brass in the mid 1980s Through1986, I was on top of the world. Myquality was great, my projects were asellout, my hobby shop was doinggreat, my staff was terrific and it wastime to graduate from freight cars towhere the money was... HO Steam.RIGHT!◆42 • O Scale Trains
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