[wireandpaper]

Following the suggestion of Ms Czolczynska, while I was visting their Facebook site, I notice the sad news of the passing of Professor Andrzej Samek (1924-2018).He was a true polymath and a very influential paper model designer. As a professional he was a researcher at the Cracow University of Technology and the AGH University of Science and Technology, in the nascent field of automation and robotics. In addition he was a sea shell collector, and a “karton” model designer! This is before CAD-software, computers, printers, or even copiers that could reduce or enlarge. So he probably was armed with a pencil, eraser, ruler, French curves, knife, scissor, and Indian (Chinese for me) ink for the final drawing.
As far as I know he was responsible for a wealth of designs since 1952 with a lot of ships in my favorite scale 1/400, some planes and some armoured fighting vehicles. His ship designs spanned from civilian boats, submarines, pre-dreadnoughts, dreadnoughts , aircraft carriers, and atomic rocket cruisers (the only USS Long Beach I have seen in Karton). He was responsible for the inaugural issue of Maly Modelarz of landing crafts with a Chuchill tank.
This is a translation from JSC page: “We got a very sad message. In Krakow, died prof. Andrzej Samek. There is probably no modeler in Poland who would not know this name. Mr. Samek had been designing cardboard models since the beginning of model making in Poland. It can be said that he created cardboard modeling in our country. He began with the design of models issued by the Ministry of National Defense (MON), and later created for the Maly Modelarz.After a break, he returned to design in the nineties and continued designed models for JSC for many years. It is very sad to say goodbye to such a great person, a man with a real passion for modeling, but the memory of him will remain alive forever.”
We are thankful for his legacy, rest in peace!