Original subtitles

[narrator] A rusting vessel that once set sail

to find a shipwreck full of gold.

It carried the greatest lost treasure

in United States history.

[narrator] A house of correction where the building itself

dealt out punishment.

If you get your hand in there, when that 60,000 pounds come

around there, it's gone.

[distant scream]

[narrator] And a huge forgotten complex

that taught America how to laugh.

[woman] If it wasn't for them, the American entertainment

scene might look very different today.

[narrator] South of Jacksonville on the St. Johns River

lies a collection of rusting

and forgotten vessels.

[Dr. Mitchell] Among this crowd of boats, there's this lonely old ship

clinging to the side of one of the docks.

You can imagine it in its prime, smashing through

the waves in whatever nature could throw at it.

[narrator] It once took a daring crew on a mission

to find a hoard of lost gold.

It was the storybook treasure, no doubt about it.

[narrator] But this story doesn't end at sea.

[Bell] What happened when they made it back to shore is

scarcely believable.

It's the stuff of a Hollywood script.

[narrator] The leader of the voyage would end up a fugitive,

the focus of a nationwide manhunt.

[Szulgit] The authorities actually started posting billboards

boards with his face saying, have you seen this man?

Come forward and let us know.

[Bell] This has all the traits of a modern-day pirate story.

You've got shipwrecks, hidden gold,

and a man languishing in jail.

[narrator] One of the crew members on this ship's

speculative mission in 1988 was Bob Evans.

His involvement in the project began when his neighbor,

Tommy Thompson, offered him a job to locate

a very special shipwreck.

What he really offered me was, "Can you research these areas of

the ocean where we might find it?"

Tommy told me if he ever got it funded that I would get paid

for those hours, and that was, in fact, the case.

[narrator] The ship they all hoped to find was the SS Central America.

After encountering a hurricane at sea, it sank in 1857

with the loss of 425 lives.

It was an extremely famous shipwreck at the time,

comparable to the way that the Titanic became in

the 20th century.

[narrator] But the SS Central America carried more than just people.

The SS Central America was carrying an estimated

30,000 pounds of gold, all prospected during

the California Gold Rush.

[narrator] The ship was bound for New York

with a cargo of gold,

worth approximately two million dollars in its time,

roughly 300 million in today's money.

Exactly where the ship sunk, however, was a mystery.

Trying to find a ship lost during the mid-19th century in

a part of the Atlantic Ocean over a mile deep was

a long shot, to say the least.

[narrator] This is the Arctic Discoverer,

the ship that took on this impossible task.

The team located this ship frozen in the ice of

Newfoundland, retired after years working as a Canadian

fisheries research vessel called the Arctic Ranger.

This boat was perfect.

It had five scientific laboratories built into it,

and these could be used in the mission that lay ahead.

[narrator] Thompson managed to convince

161 private investors to fund the expedition.

And in June 1988, the renamed Arctic Discoverer

set sail in an attempt to find the SS Central America

and its golden cargo.

It was also equipped with an ROV,

a remotely-operated vehicle.

And this was critical, because the treasure would be

far too deep for divers to go down.

[narrator] The crew affectionately named

their remotely-operated submersible Nemo.

[Evans] Nemo was a remarkable vehicle.

I liken it a bit to like one of NASA's Gemini program,

where it was an amazing achievement at the time.

[narrator] Bob had honed in on two areas off the coast of the Carolinas,

where it was thought the hurricane-hit ship

had fatefully drifted.

In the summer of 1988, Nemo began relaying footage

from the depths to the eagerly watching crew above.

This is the control room where it all happened.

I sat at a small table here.

Over here, we had the co-pilot, his station, and his monitor.

Here was where the pilot sat with his monitor.

[narrator] For months, they were staring at blank, lifeless scenes.

But they refused to give up.

[Bell] As they sent down

their underwater robot for yet another search,

something magical appeared on their computer screens.

[Evans] Nemo swam over the SS Central America's paddle wheels

and this room erupted in joy and laughter upon seeing that.

[man] You know that is? Whoo! Ah! Ha ha!

[Rodriguez McRobbie] But the presence of the gold was still unconfirmed.

They had to wait to develop the photos to be sure.

[Evans] One of our photographic technicians, he told me,

"Go in the photo lab and have a look at what's on the table."

It was magnificent.

What they saw was beyond their wildest dreams, piles of

gold bars and gold coins.

[Bell] Finding the gold was one thing.

Getting it back to the surface was a completely

different problem.

[narrator] Retrieving the gold from over 7,000 feet below was also

a task for the multi-talented Nemo.

It had a mechanical arm that would scoop treasure into

a small storage drawer.

But the first attempt to pull Nemo back onto the ship

didn't go as planned.

[Evans] The crane with a swing mechanism on it broke.

And Nemo was wildly swinging from side to side,

suspended above the deck here.

[narrator] They eventually secured Nemo to the deck.

The sub's hydraulics had broken,

but crucially, the precious cargo it contained

was safe.

[Evans] Four of us pried open the drawer that was on Nemo

and removed the gold, and secured it downstairs

inside my laboratory.

[narrator] The damage to Nemo forced the crew to come ashore

early, but crucially, they weren't

returning empty-handed.

[Evans] This we knew that we could use to secretly announce to

our investment group that in fact we had found the treasure

and that we were ready to go out and recover this treasure.

[narrator] The following year, they returned to the shipwreck

and retrieved over a ton of gold.

[Rodriguez McRobbie] They return to shore to great acclaim, media attention,

news trucks, and armed guards.

But almost immediately, everything went south.

[narrator] In 1989, the Arctic Discoverer returned from sea carrying over

a ton of gold recovered from the 1857 wreck of

the SS Central America.

But after the initial fanfare, came controversy.

39 insurance companies came forward to claim that they were

actually the owners of the gold, because they had insured it

back in the mid-19th century.

[narrator] But as the salvagers, Tommy Thompson and his crew

expected they had a rightful claim to most of the gold.

It was down to a court to decide.

[Evans] 1992, the appellate decision came back saying that we,

as the people who worked on recovering it,

are entitled to a salvage award.

This ultimately sorted its way out through years of litigation

and lawsuits to the point where our group got essentially

92 and a half percent.

[narrator] In the year 2000, Tommy Thompson sold

the treasure to a marketing group for a reported

$50 million who then oversaw its sale

through various auctions.

But allegedly, none of his investors in the expedition

saw any proceeds.

Two companies who had invested large amounts of money

filed a lawsuit.

[Dr. Mitchell] A media circus built up.

Some newspapers were calling Tommy a pirate who had gotten

away with stolen booty.

[narrator] After long legal delays, in 2012, Thompson was finally

summoned to appear in court.

For reasons unknown, still to this day,

he made a drastic decision

that would shape the rest of his life.

He fled.

He ran away from a federal district judge.

[Rodriguez McRobbie] The police used huge electronic billboards to enlist

the public's help to try to find Thompson.

This was a proper manhunt.

[narrator] Tommy Thompson evaded capture for two years.

[Szulgit] One of the U.S. Marshals

who was tasked with finding him said that he was

one of the most intelligent fugitives ever sought.

[Evans] He was apprehended in early

2015 in Boca Raton, Florida, and has been

essentially incarcerated ever since.

Initially only given a two-year prison sentence for

criminal contempt, the judge later ordered

that Thompson remain locked up

until he revealed the location of hundreds of

gold coins believed to still be in his possession.

[Dr. Mitchell] As long as he talked about where the coins were,

he could potentially be set free.

But instead, he denies any knowledge of the coins,

stating, "I feel like I don't have the keys to my freedom."

[Szulgit] It's hard to know what the truth is here, but one fact

still remains, and that is he's still in prison.

[Evans] I usually describe my feelings about my old friend

Tommy Thompson as extreme ambivalence.

I am thrilled that he got me involved.

On the other hand, I hate like hell what has happened to him

and the taint it has brought to what was otherwise

a really magnificent story.

[narrator] Bob returned to the SS Central America site in 2014

and helped a new crew find over 3,000 more gold coins.

The Arctic Discoverer, caught up in all the legal issues of

the first expedition, would never set sail again.

Today, the Arctic Discoverer is beyond repair,

but it still has a future.

[Bell] The Arctic Discoverer may soon join the SS Central America at

the bottom of the ocean, as there are talks for

the storied ship to be sunk and turned into

an artificial reef.

[narrator] Whatever its fate, it will always be remembered for

its pioneering voyage of discovery.

[Evans] It was a cool idea to go to sea and hunt for treasure.

I mean, how often does a human get an opportunity to actually

do that? It was a great adventure.

[narrator] In the Midwest, there's a forgotten facility

with a twist, where residents' lives took

a turn for the worse.

[Roach] You drive down the street, and you think this is a great,

big house -- you have no idea what it is.

And the people that were here, they really didn't know what

they were getting into.

[Dr. Thomas] We're in Crawfordsville, about 50 miles west of

Indianapolis, the capital city of the state of Indiana.

[narrator] Downtown, a red brick building doesn't fit in.

[Alcock] This is weird.

With its high windows and roof trims, this structure looks

like nothing else around.

It feels grand, yet when you get up close,

you can see some of the walls are in a bad way.

[Kwami] Entering through the front door,

nothing can prepare you for this.

It's a world of metal cogs and bars.

[narrator] This place once represented a groundbreaking

American design, but it broke far more than just

architectural standards.

[Turpin] The most incredible thing about this building is

this big, amazing machine.

We had amputated feet, amputated arms.

It's said that the terror of an event here

inspired one of Hollywood's greatest hits.

[narrator] In Crawfordsville, hundreds pass this building

each day, not knowing the horrors hidden within.

But for Phillip Roach, it's a place

close to his heart.

[Roach] I feel peace when I come into this building.

I feel like I'm at home.

[narrator] When Philip first came here,

this structure housed around 20 people.

[Roach] I knew just about everybody that was in here at the time

because most of them were from the neighborhood.

I could come back here and learn how to play checkers,

cheat at poker, and the good things in life.

While Phillip entered voluntarily,

everyone else came here against their will.

This is the Montgomery County Jail.

The Montgomery County Jail mainly housed prisoners for one

or two nights for minor misdemeanors,

but it also housed the sheriff and his family.

My uncle, Roy Hardaker, was the sheriff in 1949 to 1951,

and that's when I first entered this building.

[narrator] Constructed in 1882,

the Montgomery County Jail was

a guinea pig for the American penal system.

It was the first of only a handful of rotary jails

built across the nation.

[Alcock] Rotary jails were built with spinning cell blocks.

It was meant to be a cost-saving idea because each

floor had only one exit and entrance,

meaning fewer guards were needed.

[narrator] Brittney Turpin has spent the last 10 years

learning this building's treacherous secrets.

[Turpin] Right now, we're standing underneath the jail.

This is the railroad turntable that the cell block sits on.

[Dr. Thomas] The jail itself is made up of 16 wedge-shaped cells that are

put together in a cylindrical block with two levels,

eight cells on each level.

This is a place that was a carousel for convicts.

So this is the hand crank, and it turns both the first

and second floor at the same time.

When it was first built, it only took about

14 pounds of pressure for it to move.

[narrator] Yet this custodial contraption had one major flaw,

one that broke not just the will of the prisoners,

but also their bones.

[narrator] Holding prisoners in a spinning cell block,

the rotary jail in Crawfordsville, Indiana,

was a revolutionary design.

But some of the people who were held here lost more than

just their freedom.

[Kwami] When the guards were rotating the cells,

sometimes those prisoners weren't ready,

and their limbs would be dangling outside the bars.

[Dr. Thomas] The jail would rotate very, very quietly.

The prisoners didn't know to remove their arms,

and bad things could happen.

If you get your arm in there, when that 60,000 pounds come

around there, it's gone.

[distant agonized scream]

[narrator] With prisoners arrested for only minor misdemeanors like

drunk and disorderly conduct, losing their limbs while in

prison wasn't acceptable.

So in 1933, authorities stepped in

and stopped this slammer from spinning.

When taking custody of a person,

you are responsible for their wellbeing.

And the rotary jail just wasn't the kind of place that

you could keep people safe for very long.

So the gears and mechanisms that made it move were

eventually welded shut.

[narrator] But amputated limbs were just the beginning of the horrors at

the Montgomery County Jail.

In 1885, an inmate named John Coffee

was sentenced to death by hanging.

He was accused of killing the farmers here.

[Dr. Thomas] It was well known that John suffered from intellectual

disabilities and was considered very vulnerable.

He was easily persuaded.

[narrator] Whether John was guilty or not is still debated to this day.

Yet while he was held here awaiting his execution,

he formed an unlikely camaraderie.

[Kwami] The guards were aware of his vulnerabilities and that

he was a good-natured man.

They liked having him around, and they even warmed to him.

An example of that is that they knew John was afraid

of the dark.

[Turpin] The first night that he stayed in the jail, he was distraught,

he was scared, and we know that one of the guards stayed with

him that night so that he wouldn't have to be alone.

[narrator] Regardless of these friendships, on October 15th,

1885, John took center stage in Crawfordsville's first

public execution, which took place in the courtyard here.

[Turpin] The county did sell tickets so the public could come

and view the execution.

There was approximately 250 people here.

[narrator] Despite a sense of excitement in the crowd, no one was

prepared for what would happen next.

The first two attempts to execute John failed.

Each time, the rope broke.

The accounts from the newspapers state that

people were actually vomiting in the crowd, watching Coffee

fall to the ground, get picked back up with blood

coming out of his ears.

[narrator] Yet this was only the start of the event that still haunts

Crawfordsville to this day.

On the third attempt, the rope didn't break,

but it also didn't tighten very hard around his neck.

It meant that he had a very drawn out execution.

[Roach] It was a gruesome way to go.

It didn't break his neck, it just choked him to death.

[Alcock] It took nine minutes for John's heart to stop.

It's impossible to imagine the horrors of watching

this prolonged death rattle.

But many claim it inspired one of America's greatest books

and films, Stephen King's "The Green Mile."

While Stephen King has never said that this story influenced

"The Green Mile," the similarities are striking.

[Alcock] The main character in "The Green Mile" was also called

John Coffee, although spelt differently.

They were both convicted of similar crimes.

They both had learning difficulties, were afraid of

the dark, and struck up relationships

with their guards.

Surely this is all more than just a coincidence.

[narrator] Fortunately, throughout the 20th century,

the horrors John Coffee faced here were never repeated.

But in the 1970s, a peculiar pattern of arrests

began to appear.

Prisoner numbers would shoot up, and they were way higher on

the weekends than they were for neighboring towns.

Bizarrely, it turned out that some townsfolk were

intentionally getting arrested.

[narrator] This boost in the inmate population

was all thanks to one woman,

the jail's matron, Liz Shull.

[Turpin] When Liz was serving as the matron in this facility,

she did get the reputation of being an exceptionally

good cook.

[Alcock] Married to the sheriff, Liz lived in the prison

and treated the inmates like they were her extended family,

often feeding them what her family

were having for dinner.

[Dr. Thomas] Word spread around town that on Sunday,

Liz would make fried chicken,

and on Monday morning, she would have biscuits and gravy.

Strangely, arrests shot up on Sundays.

[narrator] Yet these culinary highs couldn't save the jail.

Even while Liz worked here, authorities forced it to shut.

The jail closed in 1973 because the need for the inmates

really outgrew the size of the facility.

[Roach] It was antiquated.

They just didn't have enough facilities to

handle the prisoners.

[narrator] Today, over half a century since it's shut,

the Montgomery County Jail has reopened as a museum.

[Turpin] I'm the executive director of the foundation that

oversees the facility.

We have approximately 4,000 visitors a year that come

into the jail.

[narrator] While being the only functional rotary jail in America helps to

draw in visitors, the highlight of many a visit

is hearing the stories firsthand from Philip.

[Roach] I still have a great time in here.

I love giving the tours.

This here is a step in the American penal system.

There's 150 years of history, and that's unusual.

[narrator] In New York's Hudson Valley sit the remains of

an iconic destination that helped shape American culture.

I was part of the fourth generation

of my family to be here.

There's probably nothing in my life that makes me more proud.

[Alcock] We're near the Catskill Mountains.

It's about 80 miles north of New York City,

an area of natural beauty.

We're talking forests, mountains, and waterfalls.

[narrator] Just south of the small town of Ellenville, a number of

abandoned structures stand out among the wilderness.

[Meigs] The buildings are kind of a mishmash, as if they were

built at different times without much of a master plan.

[Meares] What I first noticed is this huge tower must be

10 stories tall.

This is something you'd expect to see in the big city,

not in the middle of nowhere.

[Szulgit] Dotted around are various sports facilities,

tennis court, playing fields, even an old ski slope.

Whoever built this place really had some money.

[narrator] Vestiges of the high life lie in the very spot

they were left.

[Alcock] You can see shelves with ice skates still on them

and even tickets strewn on the floor.

It feels like it's frozen in time.

[narrator] But before being reclaimed by nature,

this place was a hotbed of talent.

[Rubenstein] It was like you've gone to this Shangri-La for comedians

and professional athletes, but people make places.

And without the people, it didn't have

the wherewithal survive.

[narrator] These crumbling structures in the Catskill Mountains were

once a go-to destination for New York's movers and shakers.

Keith Rubenstein's family were one of many

who flocked here to escape the city.

We came here twice a year for probably 15 years of my life.

And it was just something that we looked forward to.

And it was ingrained as part of our fabric as a family.

This is the Nevele -- at its peak,

this was one of the grandest resorts in the region,

but it came from very humble beginnings.

It all started when

David Slutsky's great-grandparents

moved to New York from Russia.

[Slutsky] They tried to do some farming.

It probably proved to be not too productive.

They realized that they could rent out space

in their own home to people that wanted to come here

for the summer.

[narrator] But the Slutsky family home was getting crowded, and a regular

patron asked to build his own bungalow on the property.

My grandfather said to this man, "I have a better idea.

"I'll build a bungalow, and it won't cost you anything,

"and then when you come up in the summer with your family,

you'll pay the rent."

[narrator] Mr. Slutsky had tapped into a growing market that would

bring guests to his door for years to come,

thanks to New York's booming immigrant Jewish population.

They needed someplace to go on vacation.

They needed to get out of the city.

These were the days before air conditioning.

[narrator] But in America, anti-Semitism was rife,

and discrimination was protected by the law.

[Meares] And many hotels had signs up that said,

"No Jews allowed" or "Gentiles only."

It was a really dark period of American history.

[Szulgit] This gave birth to something called

the Jewish Vacation Guide,

which actually highlighted areas that would

welcome Jews, many of these in the Catskills.

[narrator] Across the region, places like the Nevele provided a getaway

for those turned away elsewhere.

As Jewish vacationers flocked to the area,

it soon became known as the Borscht Belt.

The nickname came from the beet soup, Borscht, which is popular

across Eastern Europe, an area where many of

these Jewish immigrants came from.

[narrator] As New York's Jewish population became more prosperous,

places like the Nevele evolved to cater

to their needs.

And their demand for entertainment would lead to

a cultural revolution sparked in the resort's theaters.

[Meares] Borscht Belt was really the incubator of some of

the biggest comedy stars of the last century.

Their style became known as Borscht Belt humor.

[Meigs] They also mainstreamed a certain type of

Jewish-American culture.

The 1950s, Yiddish was this strange language

that some immigrants spoke.

By the 1980s, everybody knew words like klutz

and schmuck and chutzpah.

[narrator] Almost every major Jewish comedian of the era

performed in the Borscht Belt.

[Alcock] Lenny Bruce, Joan Rivers, Sid Caesar,

the list is almost endless.

[Meigs] Eventually, this kind of Borscht Belt Jewish humor

became American humor.

As a kid, I remember seeing comedians that were probably

too inappropriate for me to have seen, like a gentleman

like Buddy Hackett, who was known for his irreverent humor.

[narrator] The groundbreaking entertainment led to a surge in

popularity, which would make the Nevele

a cultural institution.

[Alcock] If you want to get an idea of what the Nevele was like in

its heyday, you can watch the movie, "Dirty Dancing."

The resort in the movie was actually based on hotels in

the Borscht Belt.

[narrator] Guests at the Nevele could even expect to rub shoulders

with some of the biggest sports stars of the day.

John McEnroe, Billie Jean King, and the like used to come here

and play against each other.

[narrator] But in the summer of 1966,

the Nevele would welcome the biggest A-lister of all.

We got a call that President Johnson needed a place to stay

because he wanted to come to the area to dedicate the new

Ellenville Hospital.

[Alcock] The president needed a place to stay with his entourage of over

100 people, and the Nevele was the only place big enough

to accommodate them all.

[narrator] The Nevele was already fully booked for the summer,

but the Slutskys weren't about to miss

this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

[Slutsky] We had to call everybody who was supposed to come for

that night and ask them to please delay their stay for

their arrival one day.

While most guests were willing to change their plans, one man

named Mr. Sugarman would put the entire presidential visit

in jeopardy.

[Slutsky] As a surprise to us, that man had called the White House.

The White House called us and indicated that if

we couldn't provide Mr. Sugarman with his room,

then the president was not coming.

Unbeknown to the Slutskys, the disgruntled guest was

a member of the Democratic Party who was coming to stay at

the hotel for his honeymoon.

[narrator] So the reservation was honored, and President Johnson stayed at

the Nevele as planned.

[Slutsky] And on the front page of the New York Times,

heading read, "Johnson Saves a Catskill Honeymoon."

[narrator] But despite this feather in their cap,

difficult times lay ahead.

[narrator] The Nevele was at the heart of the Borscht Belt,

upstate New York's Jewish vacation hotspot.

But a travel revolution was about to bring

the entire region to its knees.

In the second half of the 20th century,

airfare really decreases in price.

And so, it becomes trendy to go explore the world and not just

spend all your time on one resort's property.

[narrator] Over the years, guest numbers dwindled,

and as it entered the 21st century,

the Nevele started to fall into disrepair.

[Rubenstein] I used to bring my kids, when they were little,

just for a night, so they could see it.

And it was in a really bad state of deterioration.

All of the things that were great about it were memories.

[narrator] On July 4th, 2009, the Nevele shut

its doors permanently.

And for over a decade since, the site has sat abandoned.

Today, developer Keith Rubenstein is bringing the site

back to life by turning it into a destination wellness resort.

I think the wilderness, the landscape, and the nature is

the star of the show.

You have the ability to hike, enjoy the fresh air.

I think we have the makings of a world-class project.

[narrator] In northern Colorado, a cluster of oddly-shaped

structures marks the point where a global conflict reached

the heart of the nation.

It landed in April of 1945,

and it was right on the corner right over there.

It's kind of a sobering thought when you think about it.

[Dr. Auerbach] We are in Timnath, Colorado, a small town

at the base of the Rocky Mountains,

about an hour's drive north of Denver.

[narrator] An unusual sight sits tucked away beneath a busy highway.

[Dr. Auerbach] At first glance, this looks like a scrapyard.

There's rusting metal and old machinery everywhere you look.

[narrator] But a collection of strange metal beasts

stands out among the clutter.

[Kwami] What's striking here is that there are just so many of

these structures in this place,

and it must have taken years to make.

[narrator] These sculptures stem from the wild imagination of a man

who would go down as a Colorado legend.

[Morgan] To look at this site today, you would never imagine that

a foreign power would attack the location, but that is

exactly what happened here.

[narrator] Among the big box stores and fast food chains,

this rusting metal menagerie

seems at odds with its surroundings.

Ken Swets knows firsthand how much this place has changed

throughout the years.

My grandparents moved here in 1942.

This was all farm ground as far as you could look.

[narrator] But in 1945, this peaceful farm, almost 1,000 miles from

any ocean, would become the unlikely site of one of

World War II's most bizarre offensives.

[Swets] My uncle was in this general area sometime

during middle of the day, I believe.

-He heard a loud boom and a flash of light. -[boom]

Not knowing what was going on, he ran back to my grandfather's

house, and my dad said that he was white as a sheet.

[narrator] Eight-year-old Jack Swets had just witnessed

a last-ditch attempt to turn the tide of the war

by one of America's desperate foes.

Japan came up with a plan to weaponize the jet stream,

and that plan would involve balloons that could be released

in Japan and would be carried all the way across the breadth

of the Pacific Ocean, and that they would come down

then in the Pacific Northwest.

[narrator] Over 9,000 of these hydrogen-filled paper balloons

were released between November 1944

and April 1945.

Each contained several incendiary bombs,

as well as one larger high explosive.

Upon release, a timing device would carefully calculate

the way that the balloon progressed.

It would manage its maximum height and its minimum height.

[narrator] The balloons would reach the U.S.

after three or four days, and having lost most of

their hydrogen, begin to sink.

It would come down somewhere from Oregon all the way over to

maybe Michigan, and that somewhere in there,

it will find a forest and set it on fire.

The Japanese hoped if we could start thousands of fires,

maybe it would so cripple the United States that it would

greatly complicate the war effort for them.

[Dr. Auerbach] The ultimate goal was to spread fear and anxiety

amongst the American population.

They were essentially weapons of terror.

[narrator] Adding to the fear and confusion, as soon as

they dropped the bombs, the balloons were designed to

disappear without a trace.

The Timnath incident seems to be an excellent case of

a balloon bomb that did everything it was supposed to.

What Jack Swets saw that day

was a balloon bomb that came down.

It dropped its high-explosive bomb, which was

the first explosion, and then the self-destruct

sequence began as the balloon began its rapid ascent,

and the flash of light in the sky that he saw was

11 pounds of thermite consuming what was left of

the balloon envelope.

[Swets] My dad had mentioned that immediately, of course,

the government was here.

They wanted to shut down any public knowledge

about what had happened.

[Dr. Auerbach] Since the government was suppressing any news

of the explosions, the balloon bombs didn't spread

anxiety and terror as intended.

The ban on reporting also led the Japanese to believe that

the balloons hadn't really had any effect, and the project

was deemed a failure.

[narrator] Once the war was over, the Swets family looked

forward to a bright future

and would go on to turn this place into something

no one could have imagined.

[narrator] The Swets' family farm in rural Colorado was the site of

a rare Japanese balloon bomb attack during World War II,

but it would soon gain notoriety

for an entirely different reason.

[Swets] My grandfather had started to advance in age

and had some health-related issues.

So my father took the farm over in 1975.

[narrator] Ken's father, Bill Swets, would run the farm with

his wife, Sandy, and they would have three boys of their own.

But soon, tense times would lead him down

an unexpected path.

My dad was a volunteer fireman.

He always kind of had trouble winding down,

especially if he'd get a call late at night.

So he kind of started just tinkering around in his shop,

just kind of started building stuff.

As time went by, he was making larger and larger pieces.

And that turned into this sculpture garden.

[Swets] My dad and my mom were talking, and my dad looked around,

and he says, this kind of looks like a zoo around here.

[narrator] This is Swetsville Zoo.

Here, at the site of the balloon bomb attack,

Bill Swets would introduce the world to

his unique creations.

These all started as just pieces laying in a big pile.

Like, for instance, this is off the front end of a car.

This is off a farm implement.

If you look up there, that's actually an oil pan.

[Kwami] Swetsville Zoo became a destination for local

residents, and it also attracted folks on road trips from

around the globe.

[narrator] As the zoo's popularity grew,

Bill always insisted on one thing.

It was important to my dad, and it meant a lot to him to be

able to share it with people.

You know, he always wanted to keep it free.

Bill's zoo was hugely popular with locals

and people passing through town.

But an unexpected event would mean

his farm's days would be numbered.

[Swets] 1995, my mother was diagnosed with hepatitis that

she contracted from a blood transfusion back in the '70s.

The doctors gave her less than a year to live.

[narrator] Ken's father, Bill, made the decision to retire

from farming so he could spend more time with his wife, Sandy.

They traveled the country together, and Sandy would beat

all expectations and live for another 14 years.

She passed away in 2010.

[Dr. Auerbach] Since 2010, Timnath's population

has grown more than tenfold.

Timnath is essentially becoming a suburb of Fort Collins,

and it's no longer the sleepy farming community

that Bill Swets grew up in.

[narrator] This urban sprawl would soon put the zoo at risk.

The development that's encroaching is one of

the reasons that my dad has decided to leave.

[narrator] In 2022, Bill Swets sold the farm,

and the zoo closed its doors for good.

Bill Swets' land has been purchased by a development

group that plans to turn it into a new community.

Development principal Liz Newman is making sure

the zoo's sculptures have a home here.

[Newman] Swetsville Zoo has been so important to this community for

decades and we don't want it to go away just because

we're developing it -- we wanna preserve the heritage.

There's fascinating links to history that you wouldn't

expect in this place.

I think it's so great that this sculpture garden

is going to be preserved.