The General Lee Flies Again

As a fan of the classic TV era, I’m always excited by those times when life imitates art.

One of them happened a few weeks ago in Somerset, Kentucky, population about 12,000, when 40,000 people showed up to watch the General Lee jump over a fountain in the town square.

The event was organized by a local car club and a stunt group called the Northeast Ohio Dukes of Hazzard County. The man behind the wheel was Raymond Kohn, who had performed similar jumps before. Each one requires months of preparation and planning.

“You get one shot at it. This is a very scary situation,” he said. “You’re putting yourself in a life-and-death situation on purpose.”

So why do it? Why drive a car at top speed up a ramp, soaring more than 150 feet in the air, before hitting the ground – hard – risking life and limb in the process? And Kohn wasn’t the only one in danger. When the General landed parts of the car were sprayed out along the road, and one cameraman barely got out of the way as the car skidded toward a row of barricades before stopping.

I think moments like this say something about the magic of television, of the relationships forged between characters and the viewers who idolized them. Over the course of seasons and years they became as familiar to us as our own families, and we wanted to visit them and share in their stories. Since that isn’t possible, we look for ways to bring some of their fictional world into ours.

That’s what happened when the General flew that day in Kentucky. It couldn’t hit the ground and keep moving the way it did when Bo Duke was driving, but that was the other magic of television. 

In reality every car jumped on The Dukes of Hazzard was immediately totaled. Over the course of the series more than 300 Dodge Chargers flew over rivers and barns and trains and then were ignominiously towed to their final resting places.

But that was okay. In the moment, as fans, we believed. And in that moment in Somerset, thousands saw something they only ever thought they could see on TV.

There have been other such crossovers – the Brady Bunch house, for instance. HGTV bought the home shown on every episode of the series and completely transformed the interior, so it now matches the layout and frozen-in-time décor of the rooms that once existed only on Paramount soundstages. I’m planning my visit later this year.

Southfork Ranch, as seen in Dallas for 13 years and more than 350 episodes, is also open for tours. According to the website, you can see Lucy’s wedding dress, the Dallas Family Tree and Jock’s Lincoln Continental.

Here in Las Vegas, the Las Vegas Hilton was once home to Star Trek – The Experience, a combination dining/shopping/museum/attraction which might have been the only place on earth where one could purchase a six-pack of Romulan Ale.

The first time you enter what you think is going to be a motion simulator attraction, the lights suddenly go out, and when they come back on you find yourself standing on the transporter pad of the USS Enterprise. It was a remarkably believable effect, and while you were still getting your bearings after the swerve you are escorted by uniformed crewmembers through the ship’s corridors and into a perfect recreation of the bridge.

Sadly, the attraction closed in 2008 – but there’s a recreation of the original series’ Enterprise in Ticonderoga, New York.

With the cultural impact of television having declined significantly since the year 2000 or so, I think it’s unlikely that any series will ever achieve a level of popularity that would manifest itself in a similar way. Just look at the recently announced Emmy nominations and consider whether a series with eight episodes on Apple TV+ could ever penetrate the public consciousness the way network shows once did. People don’t seem to take their favorite shows to heart the way they used to – you’ll get a phenomenon every so often like Yellowstone or Stranger Things, but will they still be on people’s minds 30, 40, 50 years from now? I wouldn’t bet on it.

Footage of the General Lee’s jump is up on YouTube, and one of the comments was “This is the America I want to live in.” Me, too – even if it’s the America that so many detest now, that would celebrate a car named after a Confederate general with a Rebel flag on the roof. We knew the difference between legacy and hate, and between fantasy and reality. And when a slice of the classic TV fantasy enters into reality, it’s always something to remember.