Tucked away in a squat grey-stone building near the Dolly Parton theme park lies an arguably much more famous relic than the country singer’s fringed jackets and bejewelled guitars.
Tourists making the pilgrimage to “Dollywood” in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, could be forgiven for driving past the lesser-frequented Alcatraz East Crime Museum, which happens to be home to the white Ford Bronco OJ Simpson used as his getaway car.
Managers at the museum have been busy dusting it off in preparation for a huge influx of visitors in the wake of Simpson’s death.
“Thursday was the craziest day in the museum’s history. Everyone wanted to see the car that has become such an iconic piece,” said Taylor Smart, managing director at the museum, which opened in 2016 to showcase “America’s wildest crime history”.
“Some people know it’s here and come to us specially for it, others are in the area for Dollywood and stop by,” she said, adding that people were already adding it to their summer holiday itinerary.
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The Bronco belonged to Al Cowlings, Simpson’s former NFL team-mate and close friend, who was driving the vehicle as Simpson sat in the back seat with a gun to his own head.
Simpson’s car had been seized as part of evidence-gathering for his trial for the 1994 murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman, outside her Los Angeles home.
Police called Simpson during the low-speed chase and begged him to turn himself in. Spectators lined the streets of Los Angeles to cheer Simpson on, and an estimated 95 million people nationwide watched on TV as networks cut into their broadcasts to showcase the surreal scene.
“Different generations have different responses to it, but I think the case transcends that. Everyone knows at least something about the trial of the century,” Smart said.
• Victims’ families seek damages after OJ Simpson dies aged 76
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The story of how it ended up in Pigeon Forge is as circuitous and intrigue-filled as Simpson’s own.
Cowlings’ lawyer helped to sell the car for $200,000 shortly after the trial, in which Simpson, nicknamed “the Juice”, was sensationally acquitted.
The man believed to be the buyer, Michael Pulwer, another of Cowlings’ clients who made his money in pornography, apparently did not think the Bronco held any value and the car sat in the underground parking garage of his apartment building for long enough for it to rust.
Its movements over the intervening years until it ended up at the museum several decades later are hazy. It was spotted in such varied locations as Las Vegas and Greenwich, Connecticut.
In August 2017, not long before Simpson was released from a Nevada jail for committing an armed robbery, the white Bronco was featured on an episode of Pawn Stars. Mike Gilbert, a former Simpson agent, said he bought the vehicle from Cowlings. Gilbert turned down a $500,000 offer and said he would never sell the vehicle for less than $1 million.
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The museum declined to say how the car ended up in its possession, citing privacy concerns.
It is not the only vehicular piece of crime lore in the museum’s collection. Alongside it is a 1968 Volkswagen Beetle that was owned by the serial killer Ted Bundy, the 1933 Essex-Terraplane used by the bank robber John Dillinger and the so-called death car from the movie Bonnie and Clyde, riddled with bullet holes.
The museum is housed in a building designed to look like a cross between Tennessee State Prison just outside Nashville and the original Alcatraz, in San Francisco Bay.
After news of Simpson’s death, the museum put up a sign next to the Bronco that displays a set of his golf clubs. At least two visitors learned of his death from the sign.
“What a day to visit,” said Michael Patience, who happened to be there at the time. Patience, who is from Kentucky, said he remembered the car chase like it was yesterday. “I don’t think I’ve been glued to my screen like that since, well, maybe when the [Kentucky] Wildcats last made the finals.”
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There has also been renewed interest in OJ memorabilia. One collectables store in Las Vegas, the city Simpson was living in before his death, said it had already made 40 sales to customers interested in “conversation pieces”.
