Well, maybe it’s not a myth. This is the first I’ve heard of it. A friend of mine just reported to me a story for how the SR-71 was outed. He says it was because Mattel came out with a model of the plane, calling it a spy plane. He furthermore stated this happened in 1982. I was skeptical, partly because I have memories of this plane from before 1982, so I did some googling and found a Revell SR-71 model dating to 1969. I couldn’t find anything about this yarn of his. Is there any truth to it? Could he be thinking of a different plane? A different date? A different toy company?
I think he had the SR-71 confused with the F-117.
It was a 1986 Testor’s “artist’s conception” of something that kind of looked like an F-117.
Ah, that makes a lot more sense. Thanks.
Revell did get their teat in the wringer for their model of either the “SSN Nautilus” or one of the Boomers, can’t remember which it was, this was in the late 50’s or very early 60’s.
You’ve successfully planted a new image in my mind. With regard to wringers, I’m used to thinking of hands. Of course, these days, half the population probably doesn’t even know what a wringer is. 
A wringer is like a mangler, right?
Yes. Here’s one showing both words.
media
Maybe the OP’s buddy was thinking of the Aurora ?
Several kit mfrs have produced (wildly different) iterations
of this ‘Blacker than Black’ project !
It was the Nautilus- several were purchased by the Russian Embassy, or so I’ve heard.
I was on a tour of the F22 and F35 demonstrator at Lockheed-Martin and I wanted to ask has anyone on the forums seen the SR72 that was on aviation week? Matter of fact I’m going to make a thread… 
Just an interesting tidbit about the F-117 and your timing. I was in Texas at the Carswell AFB air show in Ft Worth - early 1990. Probably February or March - but the F-117 was on display at the show - we were told that this air show was the first where it was exhibited to the public for viewing. Not sure if that was true or not. This was right before it was put into action in desert storm, of course.
On 24 July 1964, the President Lyndon Johnson announced the existence of the SR-71.