“You’re gonna like it,” he told me, eliminating the “secret” element. I pulled the wrapping away from the present and revealed a red plastic garage with two toy cars inside. This was surely not a Thundercat, He-man nor Transformer. “Pretty cool,” he told me. I felt like crying.
Model cars first appeared in the early 1900s as plaster or iron toys. They were designed for children and had no moving parts. In the ‘30s, popularity with the cars was at a fever pitch with military vehicle replicas. Then car companies started to build scale models that showcased their new product lines. In the 40s, banks started to give away model cars when somebody opened a new account. On the bottom, many read: “To help save for a rainy day, or to buy a new Chevrolet.” 
