A 1969 Dodge Charger from The Dukes of Hazzard television show will remain in a Volo, Illinois, auto museum, according to the Northwest Herald.
Although symbols of the Confederacy have been removed nationwide, Volo Auto Museum Director Brian Grams said the “General Lee,” which sports a Confederate battle flag on its roof, will remain on display.
“We feel the car is part of history, and people love it,” he told the newspaper. “We’ve got people of all races and nationalities that remember the TV show and aren’t offended by it whatsoever. It’s a piece of history and it’s in a museum.”
The car is the sixth General Lee and the only surviving incarnation of the car from filming in Georgia, according to the museum’s website.
“The first season of Dukes of Hazzard was filmed in Georgia. To cut production costs for season 2, filming was relocated to California. A total of 6 General Lees were built for Warner Bros. during the Georgia production,” the site reads.
It continues:
So what makes this car so special? It survived! Because of the disruption in filming locations this car avoided the fate that more than 230 General Lees faced, total destruction. When filming wrapped in GA, there were a total of 6 General Lees on set, 2 that were totally destroyed, 3 in usable condition and this car which had not yet been used.
Of the 6 cars, 2 of them were scrapped, 3 of them were shipped to CA where they continued to be used and eventually destroyed. Then there was the final car, this car, which was sold to the TV shows transportation coordinator, Don Schisler, for $10 and “consideration” to cover the money still owed to him by WB.
Grams said he never had a complaint about the iconic car but received several positive comments about leaving it on display, adding that people complimented the museum for “not having a knee-jerk reaction to remove it like a lot of places are.”
“If we’re going to get complaints about the General Lee being here, we’ve got much worse items over in our military building,” he concluded.