Fredrik Strom, Stockholm, Sweden
“Here is a Curtiss Hawk parked in a blast pen to protect it from Soviet air attacks on the Finnish air base at Nurmoila,” Fredrik writes. “It’s inspired by pictures I found in Suomen Ilmavoimien Historia (Finnish Air Force History) No. 5: Curtiss Hawk 75A/P-40M, by Kalevi Keskinen and Kari Stenman (Stenman, ISBN 978-951-98751-9-4) about the Curtiss Hawk 75A in Finnish service during World War II.” Fredrik built Special Hobby’s 1/32 scale Curtiss Hawk 75 with Eduard flaps and Techmod decals. The blast pen is balsa wood and the figures are a mix of plastic and resin. “The Finnish swastika, the Hakaristi, had been in use since 1918 and had nothing to do with Nazi Germany,” Fredrik says. “It was painted on a Thulin biplane donated to the Finns by the Swedish Count von Rosen. Its use was banned after World War II by the Allied Control Commission due to the symbol’s association with Nazism.”