In a connection to past terra cotta concoctions, a sign at Season’s Tavern in North Hudson said for days in October about a burger of the month, “try a Claymaker.” Maybe some of that leftover clay they were trying to hawk could have been used to make terra cotta soldiers, which could conceivably guard the rest of their clay from being absconded with by hungry patrons — if their original Claymaker burger was not enough.
All this rings familiar to me because of a story I wrote several years ago involving a mysterious businessman named Don Trent, who had holed up in his town of Hudson warehouse scores of such lifesize soldiers and their also terra cotta horses and chariots, which he insisted were original from an ancient Chinese dynasty and even had remnants of gold in their makeup.
Hundreds of such soldiers had once guarded a huge underground excavation on the behalf of a long dead Chinese ruler. The ones here were still were in big, packed full of wrap shipping crates, and were being opened carefully as I watched for a four-hour tour that lasted beyond midnight.
Don said he was biding his time until he could secure a site for a tourism-based museum — with the rare blessing of the Chinese government on such matters — to place them. He called me when I was on deadline and offered me an exclusive, if I could come right away, but only if I’d sign a contract requiring no premature publication on my part.
After a few years of no terra cotta commitment from a buyer, I went ahead and spilled the beans, in print, on the caper.