he's been listening to the wrong people. he's gone in for drugs, loose morals, and wants and destruction. he blames that on what is wrong with america. maybe it is time that some of us should start reminding him what's wrong with america. so you are now currently on the property of mr. howard hankison's, it's an industrial recycling area, and mr. hankison's has owned as much as 600 acres here, and has auctioned off some of it to a golf course. but this is a small sliver of what is remaining of the 400

acres. and the significance of that, is that he was involved or partially involved in the creation of the original presidents park. which was a tourist site 12 miles from here. that was open from 2004 until 2010 it was the home of all 42 of the sculptures. and he actually, was also instrumental and commission in 2010 to come take the sculptures, when that park went bankrupt, and put them in his stone pressure. he did not have the heart to do that and so he spent a considerable amount of his own money, to transport all of these one by one was from that bankrupt non functional park 12 miles from here, to his property here, as a way to store them temporarily.

until he figured out what he wanted to do with them. the sculptor of all of these is the name of david adickes the and if he is still alive, he's probably in his early nineties. he was a painter, and an artist based out of houston. he was visiting friends in canada. he was coming home by way of mount rushmore, and he became so inspired that he wanted to recreate the presidents, albeit on a smaller scale, and he ended up creating three sets of them one went to a small town in south dakota, that to a park that is now also abandoned. and he is now he has set himself up in his now defunct studio, in houston, and so now

these are here. so here we are, nine years later and you can see that all of these have experienced a certain amount of decay. and as a result of that, they have become this internet sensation. i will not say that they have become this popular primarily because they are falling apart, but i suspect it has something to do with it. so here they sit, all 42 of them in this field, and we now have hundreds of people, that come down here to see them because mr. hankison's has been so generous in providing us this opportunity. they were off limits limits for years, when originally removed here from and then he wanted the public to enjoy them, but

the problem at the time though they were young children climbing on these 18 foot high statues, and the liability was a mess. so just of lively so it became completely private. the only people who are getting back here were trespassers. so i propose something to him, that allowed him or allow the public to enjoy them, and it would protect him legally in the way of a waiver form, and a modest entrance fee for the walking tour. which will start here in about an hour. and then we have separate evening photo shoots so we can coming here and shoot them under the stars. and it's been a wonderful thing so far. and that is kind of you nowhere at a standstill now, until we figure out what the future of these heads are going to be. they were originally slated to go somewhere in the northeast, that has temporarily been put

on hold. there are all kinds of other proposals on the table for people that either want to buy them, or move them, or possibly even create a studio here. until that happens, until there is some clarity to that situation, on around weakens i conduct tours on random weekends. >> does anyone know what his name was? >> old hickory. >> why did they call him old hickory? >> because he was as tough as old hickory, he was one bad dude. >> the interesting thing was, it was kind of an engineering feat, as to how we move them, because despite the fact that these are hollow, they are also anywhere between 17,000 22,000 pounds. and not that many people would find that easy to transport. you know even if it's only for

12 miles. so he ended up doing you will see that every one of these presidents, has a whole intentionally put in the top of their heads the purpose was that was to expose the steel, indo skeleton. that allowed back one of the estimators, to get them on a lift, to be able to put on a flatbed, full of tires then the strap them down and move them here one by one. the interesting thing about that, is that not all of the sculptures are the same size they are 40 to them here despite the fact that they are, they there are 43 presidents represented. that's because grover cleveland served twice. but the sculptor decided he wanted to, make seven of them,

grander than the remaining 35. that's because he thought it would be neat to, recognize the quote unquote, vip presidents. and he wanted those in a larger format. so seven of the presidents, including george, andrew, abe, both roosevelts, woodrow wilson, and actually thomas jefferson in the back. we whom he identified through interviewing historians, and presidential experts, and academics, and history teachers and such, and professors who they thought were the seven most influential presidents. that's why they are larger than the remaining 35. so it was easy for them to take the 35 smaller ones first, and with them here. and stack them in rows of 11. for some reason, thomas

jefferson, who in my opinion deserves to be upfront, with george and abe, he got stuck in the back. and that is for reasons that are unbeknownst to me. he is the only vip president, who is not in the front row. all the other ones were stacked, because the excavator had the capacity, to lift each and every one of them, based on the maximum maximum capacity of lift. but the problem was when he got to larger presidents, juan excavator, would not work. so he had to use too. and he was able to successfully then, start stacking the larger presidents in front. starting with woodrow wilson, teddy roosevelt, fdr, then he realized that if he took the final three washington, jackson, and lincoln, that it would be

ups curative to the remaining once. so he had to pick and choose which three he wanted to come up front. and these are the three that he chose. we will talk about why in a moment. so that is kind of how, the schematic and the order of them occurred. it's not chronological, it's fairly random. but most of the smaller ones, are set back in the larger ones are up front. keep george, it's one of the favorites. and he obviously, he was born i think around 95 miles from here, in westmoreland county. he was a redhead. a lot of people think he wore a wig, but he actually powdered his hair he was a distiller of whiskey. and what he called father of

the american foxhound. at any point he had about 30 different foxhounds. two of which were named drunkard, and tipsy. he had an intense fear of being buried alive. which was not uncommon back in the 1700s. people were dying of smallpox and cholera, and people suspected that those who had passed, were actually catatonic from their diseases. and sometimes you know they were buried alive. so he lived with an intense fear of that. he will never be outranked militarily. he had his own military ranking, above five star general, that forces him to never be outranked. and he was also the only president, to never live in the white house. it was not until john adams came along, where he began to occupy the white house. he did die from i believe a

throat infection infection or tracheal information, where they were blood letting him. and his last words to the world, were to swell. so andrew can, although it's tough to see from here, he had some actual, he's the only sculpture here, that mr. rankin 's, attempted to clean up. and coincidentally, he was trying to clean up some decay on his cheeks, and oddly enough andrew jackson, spent most of his life, with a scar on his cheek. because when he was young man, i believed in the tennessee militia, he took a sword to the face from a soldier, after president jackson, refused to shine his boots. he died i believe, with a

couple bullets in his chest. not from being shot, but had engaged several others in gun duels and that's why they called him old hickory. because he was tough as old hickory. the other interesting fact about president jackson, he apparently taught his pet parrot how to swear. and that sometimes became problematic in the white house for some of his guests. so people often ask me on tours you know they understand why abraham lincoln, and george washington are out front, but the big question why andrew jackson is front and center all three of these are on dollar bills. american currency. but people suspect, rightfully so, that thomas jefferson, and or fdr, should be up here front and center with the big three. i do not disagree with that. so i finally asked the owner,

why andrew jackson ended up in front and center, and his response was interesting. he said well that is simple. he's got pretty hair, and i like his apple let's. so anyway, and he does he's got great epileptics. so going on these tours and talking about presidential accomplishment, nobody cared people or entertain, and then i start to talk about how andrew jackson's parents for, and people of that stuff. people want to hear the odd stuff. president lincoln, the tallest of all of the presidents. six foot four, which was very tall for back in the day. contrary to that, the shortest president, was james madison. who was a foot shoulder effect shorter than that. james madison. and president lincoln,

assassinated in the ford theater. he predicted, his death from a dream he had had the night before. ulysses s grant, was posted up in his guest that night. who had to bail at the last moment. and on president lincoln's desk, the night he was assassinated, in the oval office, was legislation, to create the secret service. albeit not for presidential protection, but for counterfeiting purposes. i thought that was sort of ironic. he was a world-class wrestler. and supposedly, wrestled in more than 300 matches. losing only one of them. someone said he is enshrined, at the world wrestling hall of fame. which i thought was interesting. so coincidentally, i want to show you something over here. of all 42 sculptures, the only

one to take a spill, off of a flatbed, was abe. that hole in the back of his head, was not intentional. the one of the top was. but that occurred when he fell, off of the flatbed. which i thought was pretty ironic. so that is a little something about these three. the remaining 39 statues, are kind of clustered together. and in the summertime, you cannot even see, the whole right side of this entire cluster, because it so overgrown, and basically what becomes a forest. at first i had a problem with that, but then we kind of realized, it made for neat photography. and almost like this haunted forced, that you could walk through, all of these leaves and bushes, and look up at these presidents, that were

kind of enshrouded in the shrubbery. we but it finally became, so overwhelming that groundskeeper groundskeeper came, and cleaned it up and some of the presidents. here, we are obscured by weeds, and other degrasse, that is growing up. this is james buchanan. we who is the only one of all the presidents, to be staring down. if you look at the orientation of all their heads, most of them are staring straight at you. and he has this look where the angle of his head, is looking right down to you. and whether it's at day or night, it kind of in parts this creepy feeling, that makes me an easy. someone also once told me, that he was the only of all of the

presidents, to never marry. which i thought was an interesting fact. so the bearded presidents, hayes, grant, garfield they all to me, look kind of similar. you can tell that all of the neck where, from every sculpture it's time specific. you can see here that there is some military garb, with grant, where he has some stars on his shoulders. and if you go down to george bush junior, he's got some elephants on his tie, which i thought was interesting. james garfield, for want from when i read, we had an interesting talent where he could write a sentence, with one hand in latin, while simultaneous writing another sentence with his other hand, in greek. which i thought was fascinating

so bill clinton, is sometimes difficult for people to recognize, i don't know why i think he's pretty true to form. he sits there in the back, and he looks fairly young. gerald ford, he's right next to him. over here, the interesting thing about gerald ford, he was the most difficult of all the sculptures, for mr. if her mr. david adickes to create. . because his features are and pronounced. we contrary, president lincoln was the easiest for him to make, because his features are so pronounced and i thought that was interesting. thomas jefferson as you can see, probably the third most decayed president here. you see that he is starting to fall apart pretty badly. and he died so i heard, on the

same day as john adams. four hours apart. on july the 4th. which i thought was an interesting piece of history. we so on dry days in the summer, often we allow our guests to walk through here. you can see this area is pretty wet, we've had some significant weather here lately. we have never seen snakes back here, but it looks like it's an area, that is conducive to snakes. so i make sure my guests are mindful of that as they walk through here. there are all kinds of different weather, where we will conduct these tours. the neatest thing i saw was a bald eagle, circling georges head. we have been out here in electrical thunderstorms at night, where it looks like there's these lightning strikes, that are coming out of fdr's

mouth. and i have not been back here in the wintertime, but there are a lot of people that would absolutely die to photograph, or see these in the snow. so that will be very exciting. and also in fog. fog is perfect, i'd like to see these and experience them in the fog. second one over here, this is one of not my personal favorites, but this is fdr. who died in his fourth term the hole on the top of his head, that is pretty pronounced, relative to the holes on the rest of their heads. i don't know why, but you can see the steel infrastructure coming out of the top of it. he supposedly, was a victim of polio and i have read somewhere, that some current position nowadays, are not absolutely convinced he had polio, but

rather a disorder. regardless of the authenticity of that claim, is because of, it because he was a victim of polio, or reportedly had that, that because he was such a high profile individual, a lot of people say thousands of lives were saved because of the acceleration of the time line and the appropriation of funds, that ended up in the vaccine that was created for that. and i thought that was an interesting tidbit of information. so this is george bush jr., who is also highly decayed. if you can zoom in on his tie, you can see where he has the elephants. a lot of people love seeing that. so the most decayed president, is woodrow wilson. pretty much looks like he has leprosy. the question always comes up,

is there a reason why these guys, we are decaying at a faster rate, than the remaining ones. and i do not understand or know if there's any reason behind it. perhaps, he is in a wind pattern or rain pattern, that makes him more susceptible. i don't know. but what i do know, if you look pretty closely, at this president, who was a virginian native president. look at his right eyeball. that is a wasps nest. and often you will see them in the nostrils of the sculptures as well. so a few of them are starting to miss some parts, lyndon johnson is starting to lose the end of his nose. ronald reagan, was one of them that was struck by lightning a few years back. but he has successively been cleaned up since.

and probably the most difficult, of all of the presidents to identify, is back here behind president reagan. and no one has ever gotten this right. and i had to really study him hard to figure out who it was. and that is warren harding. behind him, is john adams. who is tough to see, because of all of the overgrowth. so the needs fact, that i've come across through a lot of my research, is ronald reagan when he was asked, what his proudest accomplishment in life was, it had nothing to do with his presidency. nor his acting career. his proudest complement in life, was that he claimed to have saved, 77 lives, when he was a young man as a lifeguard. i thought that was very interesting.

so the question always comes up, will obama every ever be here? or was he ever hear? the answer to that question is, the goal for the original park, is that every time the president was to come into office, that a prototype was going to be made, as a sample and approved upon, and then brought full scale. so when obama was coming into office, they approached the owner of the park at the time, and who i think have already recognized the financial difficulties that was going on, and he declined for financial reasons to go full scale on that. so they just kept a little miniature of obama, who lived in this green shipping container, along with a miniature white house for many many years. so unbeknownst to me, one of my photography students that was here for a night workshop, decided that when i left, he

came back and settled him. so we took him. and he stole it. so thank goodness we figured out who it was, he claimed to have a weak moment, and not to be clipped maniacal, and he ended up bringing the obama statue back. and i've only brought him out five times, sometimes with security guards. because he is, very important and we do not want him to get stolen again. so is there trump? no there is not. but the owner has bought the baby one about this big. the reason i got involved in this, is my secondary profession i'm a photographer, and i specialize in abandoned structures. i love everything about abandon photography. homes churches restaurants if it's decaying it's interesting to me.

and that turned into a instagram following, and a coffee table book. called beautiful virginia. and that started going viral in the gift shop, so they ended up putting me on faculty as a speaker. and when i have three times on the weekend they semi around the state to story tell. all of these beautiful places in virginia, have stories to them. . and a lot of the public really enjoys hearing the back story. they love the pictures, but they want to know you know there's no story until they get the back story. so i started doing that for the museum, and recognized how much the public loves that, and then started doing professional storytelling, on my own. and that started in libraries, and escalated into theaters, and now i do those at the actual abandoned places themselves. so i approach the owner, about

that and told him i could protect him legally, make him some money to go back to his foundation, and allow the public to come back here. so he allowed me to do that, and it's just kind of blossomed ever since here and in other places but this is the most spectacular though >> you guys have been great any questions? >> no thank you thank you. >> okay i'm gonna check things out and come on back. you have until 4:00. >> why are you attracted to abandon places? >> two reasons, number one i love the texture, the mood, i love the mystery and that is just something from a photographic perspective that i love but on the type of personality that loves the social part about it and to be the challenge of going out in the community, and knocking on doors and walking into fire stations, and interviewing people and hanging out in diners, it all doing this in the spirit of meeting fellow

virginians, you know to me that's enjoyable. i love it i absolutely love it. so it started as a simple hobby, to grow and instagram following, has quickly graduated into a pretty strong devotion to allowing virginians to develop a deeper appreciation of their past, through visual experiences like this. ♪ ♪ ♪

next on history bookshelf, former george w. bush presidential speech writer, jonathan, horn discusses his book, the final, years and forgotten struggle. retired general -- interviews mr. horn in this event hosted by george washington's mount vernon in 2020. the let me tell you a little bit about tonight. we're going to hear from jonathan, horn a graduate of yale university. a former