Remember View-Masters? – The AMT Enterprise at 55
By Glen Swanson
In our ongoing tribute to the 55th anniversary of the very first AMT Star Trek model kit, we show the outer packet for the Star Trek View-Master.
The 21 stereo pictures feature the original series episode “The Omega Glory.” GAF was allowed to come to the Desilu set while they were originally filming this episode and shoot their own stereo pictures for View-Master. As a result, the pictures you see were not simply scenes taken from the episode but instead, they were shot separately specifically for this product by GAF using their own camera equipment.
The artwork packet for the three slide View-Master reels features the original three-foot model of the Enterprise in the foreground and an AMT 18-inch model in the background representing the USS Exeter.
This is one in a series of original postings created to commemorate the 55th anniversary of the very first Star Trek model kit. In June of 1967, Michigan-based Aluminum Model Toys (AMT) Corporation began selling an 18-inch injection-molded model of the starship Enterprise. Before the year was out, AMT would sell over a million copies of the kit. Since that first release, AMT and its successors went on to release at least 23 unique kits making it one of the longest running and most successful Star Trek licensees in the history of the franchise. A close-to-the-original 1:650 scale model kit is still being manufactured and sold through Round2 LLC, the current AMT licensee. Just in time to celebrate the 55th anniversary of the kit’s first release, Round2 has reissued the kit in the more commonly seen second long box (S951) form that first appeared in 1968 which features on the box top an assembled model kit orbiting the Earth.
