Mount Pleasant Magazine Sept/Oct 2016

78 / 178

| | 78
as banquets, parties,
proms and political
rallies; concessions;
helicopter rides; the
flight simulator; ghost
tours; and donations.
Its most important
source of revenue
is leasing the land,
nearly 300 acres in
all. Patriots Point currently takes in $1.5 million a year
in leases, from the College of Charleston, the golf course,
hotels, restaurants, cottages and the marina. That figure is
expected to reach $6 million a year eventually, when Ben-
nett Hospitality completes work on a huge complex that
will include hotels, office buildings and an amphitheater.
Burdette said Patriots Point will need that much money
and more to save the Yorktown. Since it is sunk into the
mud and can’t be moved, repairs will have to be completed
in place, at a cost of $60 million.
“The work has to be done here,” said Burdette. “If you
pulled it out of the mud, it would sink.”
And, without the Yorktown, Burdette and his staff
would be unable to
bring their dreams
to fruition. One of
their aspirations is
to establish an area
of the ship where
visitors can put on
goggles and see a
3D version of the
Japanese attack on
Pearl Harbor. And, before long, they will be able to down-
load an app for their smartphones that will provide a view
of what specific areas of the ship looked like in 1943.
“The technology that’s going to be available in the
next 20 years is incredible. If we’re not a part of it, we’ll
be left behind,” said Burdette. “This is where museums
have to go.”
“We’ll never run out of ideas that will bring this ship to
life,” he concluded.
Patriots Point officially celebrated its 40th birthday on Aug.
27. The admission fee that day was the same as it was in
1976: $2.
The USS Yorktown is the centerpiece of Patriots Point. Photo courtesy of Patriots Point.