Funnily enough, I was thinking of something along these lines yesterday. A bloke I used to work with once told me about his Dad, who had been a fighter pilot. When he graduated from his fighter course, the RAAF was transitioning from Mustangs to Vampires, and everyone wanted to fly the jet, so he was disappointed when he got the piston posting first.
Predictably, though, he loved the Mustang, and a couple of years down the track got the jet conversion too, so he had the experience of a classic machine that a lot of his mates missed out on.
Long live the classics I say.