In the mid-70's the RAF Hercules fleet had regular runs to a little place called Decimommanu, a very small Italian airbase on the island of Sardinia. This was used as a base for "fast jet" squadrons to do training with live weapons in a range area near the island. The "ground time" for off-loading/on-loading was usually around 90 minutes, although 3 hours was "allocated". Once complete all we wanted to do was get away early .. no-one wants to hang around for 90 minutes for no purpose.
The civilian who ran air traffic, and was the ONLY person who could get your early departure approved, just happened to be married to the lady who ran the little coffee shop, who also sold souvenirs and other things ....... those "other things" included Hornby 00 electric train sets and Scaletrix sets ... there was obviously a link between the shop and ATC as within 5 minutes of either a train set or a scalectrix kit being purchased then clearance to depart early came through .... if no kit was purchased then no clearance ... co-incidence .. we thought not

There was actually a register set up on the squadron listing who had purchased and who had not .... and that was partly used in allocating crews !! Needless to say ... we all had them. As I "lived in" I had no space for one .. but all my cousins, and friends kids, used to get very similar birthday and christmas presents !!