PTL / Heritage USA: 22 Years Later- 6/26/09- Vid #5

Still on the 3rd floor of the Main Street area of the old HGH. I made my way to the balcony area overlooking the Main Street "street" level below. You can get a good idea of just how well the storefronts looked on the inside. At one point, in the 80's , they looked just as nice on the outside! The small eatery two floors below me was operational, and there were about 10 - 15 people seated at the tables below, talking amongst themselves.

At 1:50, another HGH-era bell hop cart. The hotel, it would seem, was eerily completely vacant for a summers' Friday afternoon. It made me feel uneasy- like I wasn't supposed to be there.

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[TheSELFShow]

So were the mainstreet shops outside in the 80's and are now inside? I walked down that street and thought wow this is amazing

[CincinnatiGifts]

@TheSELFShow- The shops were always indoors. The entire structure (the former HGH- Heritage Grand Hotel, Main Street, the cafeteria and the auditorium) looks almost completely the same now as it did in the 80's. The only major differences are that the outdoor Main Street shop facades looked like they do on the inside, complete with 1860's styling, and the lobby of the HGH was filled with vintage-inspired hotel lobby furniture as well as an indoor pool, whereas now it is indoor church seating.

[NolanRogers2]

Nice videos mate.

I read about Heritage USA in an American Christian Magazine and I always wanted to visit.

The idea of a Christian Theme Park in Europe would never fly. Only in the USA.

[CincinnatiGifts]

@NolanRogers2... You think so? No one thought Disney could make one work in Europe, either, and one in France has been running for 15 years. Jim Bakker could've made Heritage USA work in Europe....he already had PTL shows in most major countries an languages worldwide.

[CincinnatiGifts]

@NolanRogers2... Like many other ideas, Heritage USA was an idea before its' time. Maybe the US will be ready for another type HUSA in THIS century.... or the next. I likely won't be around to see it.

[ThoughtTraveler]

@ 00:52 - you are in the same spot when you filmed the pool from above in your 1988 video - 22 years later. LOL!

[CincinnatiGifts]

LOL, indeed! I remembered filming from that vantage point in the 80's, and decided to get a near-same-vantage point two decades later.

Aside from the place being almost totally vacant, and the round tables now occupying the Main Street area, Main Street itself looked the most like I had remembered it from the 80's. At least the 1860's-style interior building facades were still present.

[cheeriosinabowl]

Wow, this is excellent footage of HGH. It is amazing the place looks relatively good after all these years, without anyone taking care of the place. There is a definite sense of eeriness to the place as well, sometimes very much so. Imagine how this place would feel at night, during a rainstorm, for example?

The place should be teeming with people, but it is spookingly quiet, esp. when you look down those long hallways in the hotel.

Thanks for uploading this gem!

[CounterCultureLives]

@CincinnatiGifts Methinks otherwise. The problem was that in it's heyday, Heritage USA wasn't just bleeding, it was hemorrhaging red ink. Today, it would just be a place for Muslim terrorists to ply their trades. :0(

[NolanRogers2]

@CincinnatiGifts

I would LOVE the idea of a Christian Theme Park in Europe. My point is that the UK/Europe is SO Anti God it is sickening.

[liketohavefun2007]

this was a beautiful place, my church went several years ago. i was wondering do it still look like it was all i remember is the streets where paved with gold.