I have a very similar experience about a decade later in a follow-up organization to the SVAZARM/pioneer ones.
By that point the control line planes were just hanging from the ceiling and detonation engines were on the way out with glow spark replacing them mostly. People also had general acces to multi channel RC and we had one vintage "communist era" single channel on/off RC set as a curiosity. :-)
I've fall into hole between rich state (when such clubs were comparably-well-funded) and rich parents and full shops (when it become possible to buy materials, engines, etc., for money of participants themselves), so our small local club has only 2 working carbureted compression ignition engines (it is named so in English according to Wikipedia) and one glow-plug engine, all other were cannibalized for parts...
By that point the control line planes were just hanging from the ceiling and detonation engines were on the way out with glow spark replacing them mostly. People also had general acces to multi channel RC and we had one vintage "communist era" single channel on/off RC set as a curiosity. :-)