A Model of Success : Selling Scale Replicas of World War II PT Boats Is a Lucrative Sideline for Torrance Teacher

They say the only difference between men and boys is the price of their toys. Tim Howard of Torrance has managed to turn a former hobby into a lucrative business selling high-priced toys to grown-up boys.

The “toys” are model PT (Patrol Torpedo) boats, beautifully intricate, four-feet long, accurate to the last detail replicas of the famous small boats that played an important role in World War II. His company, T. Howard Enterprises, has sold scores of radio-controlled PT models at up to $7,000 apiece fully assembled, to people who are captivated by the PT boat mystique. (Do-it-yourself kits cost much less, about $650 and up.)

“There’s just something about PT boats,” said Howard, 45, a science teacher at Miraleste Intermediate School in Rancho Palos Verdes. “They were fast. They had a lot of flair.” And, he adds, there was the Kennedy connection. President John F. Kennedy became famous as the WWII commander of the ill-fated PT 109.

PT boats also figured prominently in numerous World War II-based movies and TV shows, from the classic John Wayne film “They Were Expendable” (the only PT boat movie to use actual PT boats in the filming) to the 1960s sitcom “McHale’s Navy,” about a blundering crew of PT boat sailors.

There were 760 PT boats built for the U.S. Navy before and during World War II; the two companies that built them were the Electric Boat Co. of New Jersey, known as Elco, and Higgins Industries in Louisiana. The boats were used as attack craft, armed with torpedoes, deck guns and machine guns. They also served as messenger and passenger-carrying craft.

Although most famous for their exploits in the Pacific, PT boats were also used in the European Theater. Built with cross-planked mahogany hulls, the 78- to 80-foot boats carried crews of up to 17 officers and men and could reach a maximum speed of about 50 m.p.h.

Speed and stealth were the PT boats’ most valuable assets.

“They’d crawl in at night, find a target, shoot their torpedoes and then run like hell,” Howard said.

After the war ended, many of the PT boats that were overseas were burned on the theory that it would cost more than they were worth to bring them back to the United States. Only three PT boats remain, one in Portland, Ore., and two in Fall River, Mass.

Howard was born after the heyday of the PT boat. He has never been aboard a PT boat at sea. But in the 1950s, like hundreds of thousands of other American boys, he bought and assembled a plastic model of a PT boat, along with many other models.

Later, his modeling attention shifted to sophisticated radio-controlled model planes. Then, in 1980, his thoughts drifted back to the model PT boat of his youth.

“I went out and bought a model boat kit,” Howard said, “but it was terrible, really bad.” The parts didn’t fit, and even when they did they weren’t historically accurate.

Howard decided he could do better.

After extensive research, he began building a 1/20th scale model of the Elco PT boat. It was a laborious process, but eventually he completed his first model. It re-created the PT boat as it actually was, from the twin .50-caliber Browning machine guns to the ammo lockers to the deck hatches. Howard used the model as the prototype for making molds to cast later versions in fiberglass.

The original model, meanwhile, wound up in the Navy Museum in Washington as part of a display about Kennedy after Howard visited the museum and reported that it was using the wrong type of boat to represent PT 109.

Howard entered his models in boat shows and regattas and they soon won a reputation for quality and historical accuracy. In 1989 he opened his business, selling model kits to PT boat enthusiasts. Since then, he has sold more than 100 model boats, along with numerous parts for PT boat modelers.

The models are available in either “static” versions--that is, no motor--or in more expensive radio-controlled versions that will reach a speed of 18 m.p.h. on the water. That is far faster, in scale, than the real PT boats. The basic kit contains about 300 pieces that have to be assembled and painted, although Howard’s company will assemble the model for customers willing to pay the maximum price.

“I had decided there was a place at the top of the model market for this kind of thing,” Howard said. “Most of my customers are doctors, lawyers, professional people with the money to spend. The reason people pay these prices for our boat is because it’s so detailed. They know it’s going to be beautiful when they get it done. “

Ironically, given the boats’ history, Howard recently got an order from a dentist in Japan.

He has also sold models to men who actually served on PT boats, including 70-year-old Joe Di Pasquale, who was a motor machinist aboard PT 199, based out of Dartmouth, England, during World War II. The PT 199, incidentally, was perhaps the only U.S. Navy vessel with a hull painted pink, a color that camouflaged the boat when it made its dawn and dusk trips across the English Channel carrying spies and saboteurs to France for the Office of Strategic Services, the forerunner of the Central Intelligence Agency.

Di Pasquale, who painted the hull of his model PT boat pink, said Howard’s model is about as close as you can get to the real thing.

“It’s very good, very damn good,” Di Pasquale said from his home in Brooklyn, N.Y. He first saw one of Howard’s boats at a PT boat association reunion in San Diego about four years ago. Di Pasquale said: “I bought the model on the spot.”

Howard recommends boat models for everyone, regardless of age.

“Building models is great,” Howard said. “It’s sort of like your childhood coming back.”