(upbeat music) (bike revving) - [Narrator] Motorcycles hold a special place in the hearts of many Americans.

They're more than just a means of transportation.

They embody freedom and adventure.

It's an experience like no other, and it has excited many for a very long time.

In this film, we'll journey into the world's largest motorcycle museum and world renowned racetrack, how it came to be and the impact it has had on the state of Alabama.

(engine revving) In fact, the first vehicle to travel across the US coast to coast was a motorcycle.

In wartime, motorcycles became an important mode of transportation 'cause of how fast and agile they were.

One of the very first motorcycles to ever be designed was done using a steam engine.

And over many years, with a variety of designs, modern day motorcycles continue to provide its riders with a once in a lifetime experience.

(intense music) - Barber Motorsports, as it exists today, has evolved from casual discussions around motorsports and motorcycles and car restoration that started back in the early 1980s.

- [Narrator] Today, the Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum showcases the incredible journey that motorcycles have taken over the years from the early pioneers of the 1900s to the sleek racing bikes of today.

Each motorcycle tells a story, each engine a symphony of power and precision and it was all created by one man, George Barber.

- George Barber was born in the city of Birmingham and lived almost all his life here.

His family had Barber's dairy business.

- [Narrator] His father even established the US standards for milk pasteurization.

- I go back in memories of thinking about driving and being on a milk truck and delivering milk for years and decades, and I'd have to do that every summer when I was out of school, until I got old enough to begin to race Porsches.

- [Narrator] But as he grew up, George's interest in speed became apparent.

The sport of racing had really taken off in the sixties in America and drew the attention of many drivers such as George.

- George and I first became acquainted when we were in high school together.

And then when we went off to Auburn, we were there at the same time.

We were friends on campus and both interested at that time in sports cars.

- [Narrator] He became a driver with a sports car club of America through the 1960s and had 63 winds behind the wheel of his Porsche.

- And we became acquainted more thoroughly because of our mutual interest in motor sports and cars and growing up in the same community.

- [George Barber] Started with a Super 90 Coupe and went to a A model Carrera, won the Southeastern Divisional Championship with that car and then went to 904 and drove it for a couple of years.

And then I started going back to the old Porsches of 550s and RSKs.

So all in all, about 10 or 11 years in 63 first place trophies.

- And he of course, has maintained that keen interest in motor sports ever since.

- [Narrator] But in 1972, after his father's passing, he took over the family dairy business, soon expanding it to other business interests.

- [George Barber] Had to stop racing cars at that time or slowed down significantly and started racing the milk business.

The dairy business was very labor intensive, capital intensive, 24 hours a day, very, very competitive.

- He was also involved in real estate, primarily commercial real estate.

- [George Barber] So I was really heavily into the real estate business and kind of built that as I was also running the dairy, and that's been very successful, been very fortunate with that.

- [Narrator] He achieved great success in his business endeavors over the years, but he could never shake his attraction for motor sports.

So in the early eighties, he decided to start collecting and restoring cars.

- [George Barber] I started with cars.

When I was in the dairy business, I had a truck rebuilt facility where we rebuilt trucks.

The man that was working there for me, Dave Hooper, said, let's do a car too and I said, okay.

- Initially it was antique cars, but then somebody suggested that he look at motorcycles.

There were already great car collections around the world and he thought, 'Well, I probably can't build the world's greatest car collection', but he thought I might be able to build the world's greatest motorcycle collection.

When he looked at motorcycles, he liked them for a couple of reasons.

The sheet metal of cars hides most of the mechanicals, but with a motorcycle being sort of a cross sectioned, the mechanicals had to be designed in a lot of cases to be pleasing, not just mechanically working.

And he's always been interested in industrial design.

- [George Barber] I really began to fall in love with the mechanics of motorcycles.

- The early eighties, after he had acquired two or three vintage motorcycles, the bug sort of bit him, and that started the quest to get into the industry of vintage motorcycle collecting.

This is a new concept in the South and the United States, but all over the rest of the world, motorcycle racing is a big deal.

And vintage motorcycle racing is important because that's when motorcycle racing began its evolution, which was in the late forties and early fifties.

This was primarily racing that was done in Europe, basically in England, Germany and Italy.

All of those bikes came to the United States and started the motorcycle racing back in the fifties here.

And if you want to be in touch with people that know anything about vintage motorcycles, you go to a vintage motorcycle race and there they are.

- [Narrator] Using a warehouse that once was utilized to repair milk trucks, George created his very own restoration shop for vintage cars and now motorcycles.

- Once you go to an auction or two and you are successful in acquiring some very nice vintage bikes, then people recognize you as a serious collector.

The collection being private at first became under some pressure from the public for people who wanted to come take a look at it because as you can well imagine, guests would be invited in to take a look.

And then the word got out and it didn't take very long.

Had to evolve from a private collection into a public collection just simply because it was more convenient to have it open to the public.

And then it also compelled the management of the museum to make proper displays.

- [Narrator] At that time, there were 325 motorcycles from around the world and a few vintage cars to display.

This ever increasing collection of vehicles was stored in a warehouse in Birmingham's Southside neighborhood.

Mr. Barber's love for speed was not forgotten, and he decided to sponsor a racing team to compete in events organized by the American Historical Racing Motorcycle Association.

- One of the most important things that the museum did was sponsoring its racing team because it raced all over the world.

- [Narrator] The team had incredible success winning a total of seven championships.

With such great victory, George demonstrated to the world that his collection was more than vintage bikes from a time passed.

Instead, it was a living museum.

- In 1994, he established the Barber Vintage Motorcycle Museum, which is a 501(C)(3) nonprofit.

- Mr. Barber's name is on it.

But he created it, from his personal collection when he knew this was something to do.

The mid nineties created a nonprofit, made it public so everyone could experience it and enjoy it and it grew to this museum, the largest philanthropic endeavor in the history of Alabama.

- When the museum first established itself, most of the acquisitions that the museum made were as a result of someone making a reference that we had met at either one of the races or at a motorcycle auction, which they were two or three a year off.

- I came here in 1995 and we were just a private collection in a warehouse on the Southside with no windows.

We were virtually invisible, and there was about eight of us, eight guys, and we would just restore motorcycles.

- [Narrator] George Barber realized very quickly that putting together a world class motorcycle museum required the experience of someone steeped in the motorcycle industry.

One of those people was Brian Slark.

- Most motorcycle museums like the British Motorcycle Museum, is just British motorcycles.

But here, it's such a diversified collection that if you've ever had a motorcycle, scooter, moped, whatever brand, I think you can find an example here.

So people wander through the floors and their experience in motorcycles and cars they've never seen or heard of.

- [Narrator] Born in London, England in 1938, Brian Slark was instrumental in creating a vibrant motocross community in the United States during the 1960s.

- Well, I have to tell you, I've never had a real job.

I worked for a motorcycle factories in London since I was 16.

I worked for a AJS and Matchless motorcycles, rode a lot of off-road events.

I rode in the International six days trial, which is the Olympics of motorcycle.

I was very fortunate in then met one of the off road riders in California, Bud Ekins and he said, why don't you come over to California and ride the desert a bit?

And I said, I could be in southern California.

So I went back to Southern California.

I worked for a various motorcycle companies, worked for BSA, worked for Norton.

Norton, the industry folded up in 1975.

So I opened up my own motorcycle store in Southern California.

I've always been in the motorcycle industry.

Yeah, it's been my life.

- Once you become established as a serious collector, when people have something that they wish to dispose of, they call you first.

And if you're successful, then people remember your name and call you when one becomes available.

- [George Barber] I got up to about a hundred bikes and I was really having a lot of fun doing it, and a lot of fun meeting the people that were other collectors.

And I thought, with a little bit of luck, I can put together the best motorcycle collection in the world and do it here in Birmingham (indistinct) it helped my city and I'd have a hell of a lot of fun doing it.

- [Narrator] And it was George's steadfast interest in collecting these unique motorcycles that got him the attention of another museum, the Guggenheim.

- The museum participated in an initiative that was organized by the Guggenheim Museum, called The Art of the Motorcycle.

The director there, Thomas Krens, was a motorcycle enthusiast.

He looked at motorcycles as art form.

- And the Guggenheim assembled a collection of motorcycles from collectors all over the world and they wanted to put on a display at the Guggenheim in New York.

- And everybody thought he was crazy.

You know, motorcycles in the Guggenheim just didn't seem right.

The curators of the museum, they were customers of mine when I had a motorcycle store in California.

So they called me and they said, we've heard you've got some motorcycles.

I said, yeah, we've got a lot of motorcycles.

You need to come down.

And they took all of the artwork out of the Guggenheim and replaced it with motorcycle displays depicting the artwork and the evolution in the industrial and mechanical design of these beautiful pieces of equipment.

And it was a resounding success.

And I think it's the largest attendance they've ever had at the Guggenheim.

It was an absolute smash hit.

They had 114 motorcycles and we loaned 21 bikes.

We were the largest lender.

It was a fantastic experience and I think it really helped motorcycling, in general around the world to recognize the motorcycles as art form.

(intense dramatic music) - [Narrator] The experience that Mr. Barber and the entire team had at the Guggenheim really gave way to the new vision for the museum.

- During all of the 1990s, I worked for Alabama Power in their economic development department.

And my main job was to attract European investment to Alabama.

And so I was always looking for a way to get a European company emotionally connected to Alabama.

And one day I read about the Barber Museum being located in downtown Birmingham in an old warehouse.

So I went down and checked it out and from the outside it was just this old warehouse, but on the inside was 40,000 square feet of space filled with mostly motorcycles, but some old cars as well.

And then when you open the door, it was amazing just to see what was inside.

And so I realized that could be something to connect Europeans because a lot of them drove motorcycles after World War II as their main transportation.

And I got to talking with George, who was there about every day.

And I asked him what he wanted to do next because the museum was just packed out with space.

And he said that he wanted to build a new museum sometime.

And so I said, well, I know of some property I can show you.

And so I took him out there and showed him the property and he looked at it and he spent some time, you know, doing this number.

And he said, well, I might also like to build a little road racing track too.

- [Narrator] The collection was increasing and now received great notoriety.

They had already outgrown the small space in downtown Birmingham.

It was time for something bigger.

(intense dramatic music) - It was very awkward when we were downtown where we wanted somewhere where we could run the old motorcycles and run them around without getting run over because these early bikes, a lot of them didn't have any brakes.

So Mr. Barber said, well, if we're gonna do it, we'll do it right naturally.

And we ended up here, building this beautiful facility.

(intense dramatic music) - When it was a museum on the Southside, the building did not provide the right environment for a proper display.

And so we set about to look at several different properties.

This piece of property became available and was presented to George and said, 'What do you think about moving it out there and adding a race course to the equation?'

And the race course was not part of the original discussion, but of course, racing being one of the most important components of the vintage motorcycle industry, it just made sense.

And George being a former racer, said, 'Well, you know, that makes sense to me.

Let's take a crack at it.'

- [Narrator] George and his team were eager to get started on the monumental task of developing a world class museum and now racetrack.

The scope of the project would require a great deal of conversation, planning and money.

In 1998, George decided to sell the entire dairy business, which at the time reported annual revenues at approximately $208 million.

- What's a little bit unusual, the original team, none of us had any experience of museums.

We had no museum formal education, and we were just enthusiasts.

And we laid out the museum how we liked it and how we thought motorcycle car enthusiasts would like it.

- [Narrator] A landscape of considerable size was required to accommodate the large scale of Barber's dream.

It would also require consulting with world champion racers, Dan Gurney and John Surtees.

John Norman Surtees was a British Grand Prix motorcycle road racer and Formula One driver.

- Surtees did some epic rides.

He was just a young guy from humble beginnings.

And you know, he went to drive for Ferrari about the highest thing you can do.

- [Narrator] To this day, Surtees remains the only person to have won world championships on both two and four wheels.

- John Surtees is unique in that he's the only man to have won what is known as Formula One and MotoGP, so four wheels and two wheels.

We have both those vehicles here on display.

World renowned and to have both those unique motorsports stories together on display, it was really important to capture that legend status.

- [Narrator] Dan Gurney became a top racing star in America, winning races in the Formula One, IndyCar, NASCAR, Can-Am, and Trans-Am Series.

- George was trying to build a motorcycle museum and a road racing track in NASCAR country.

And so people really didn't understand, particularly the road racing track what he wanted to do.

- And with Barber's land located just 35 miles west of NASCAR's iconic Talladega Superspeedway, there continued to be some confusion for the vision Barber had.

- For many years, the only thing that people knew about racing in Alabama was NASCAR and Talladega and that is still huge.

People still come from all over the country, all over the world to go to the races at Talladega.

And what George Barber did when he built this park and this track, it gave people an entirely different perspective on what racing can mean.

- When we tried to explain it to them, you could tell that they were thinking, well, this would look something like the track that circles the high school football stadium.

And we were saying, no, it's gonna be a lot bigger than that.

- [Narrator] The track's profound design has brought major Motorsports events to Birmingham, including the IndyCar Grand Prix of Alabama.

- Well, George Barber had a tremendous vision in building this wonderful facility and it creates a lot of economic activity for our community.

But we were looking for an event that would provide the platform on an international and national basis to showcase this wonderful facility.

So the IndyCar event is that event.

- It brings people from all over the world.

It's very international in scope and it is one of our largest events on track.

It really is a favorite of the Indy drivers and it's a favorite of the local community as well.

- Race weekend is so fun.

(engine revving) I love it here.

It's so like family oriented.

It is just, I bring my family every year.

- A little bit about the track itself, it's 2.38 miles.

It's a European road course.

They call it the Alabama roller coaster because of its 80 feet of elevation change.

A lot of blind turns, a lot of blind hills, about 45 feet wide, it's freshly repaved 2019 and it's really just a thrill to be on.

- This is the first time I've been to Barber Motor Sports Park.

It's very high speed flowing circuit, high grip as well.

Lot of elevation change.

It's quite difficult to realize how much elevation change there is just by watching the TV.

I actually noticed on the track walk that it's like climbing a mountain almost at some corners.

So that's quite cool, especially at the speeds we're going.

Some of the corners are completely blind, so sort of arrive and drive.

- [Narrator] By contrast, the IndyCar race at Barber Motorsports showcases the beauty of exotic racing cars competing on a challenging road course with tight turns, high speed corners, and 80 feet of elevation changes.

But the vision was more than just a world class racetrack.

Barber felt strongly that the surrounding grounds needed to be a highlight within itself.

- It was mind boggling at first because it's a 300 acre site.

So I had to basically piece it into little quadrants so it didn't overwhelm me.

My name is Mark Whitt.

I'm track manager here at Barber Motorsports Park.

First, we had to install an irrigation system.

In the heat of Alabama summer, we have over 22 miles of pipe underneath the ground.

And what we decided to do is irrigate from a lake that we built 17 and a half acre lake here on site.

When he told me that, it scared me a little bit about the lake, having enough quantity of water.

So we all agreed to capture 80% of the site that we've touched with storm drains to capture the rain water, to send it to the lake, to add water to the lake.

So basically we're just simply recycling rain water.

I would decide what we planted and where and we did all that in-House.

- Most tracks in the United States, they're flat.

Not a lot of trees, no shade, a lot of brown.

Here we have holly bushes, we have rose bushes completely going around Tifton Bermuda, which is surrounding the entire facility.

Magnolia trees go around the the track as well.

It's a beautiful racetrack.

- Here at the park, we have over 16,000 Azaleas.

We have over 5,000 Crepe Myrtles, nine different varieties of magnolias.

The numbers here are staggering.

The Juniper's 15,000 and they were all planted by our staff.

When we first started this creation of the racetrack in park, I thought he was kind of off his mind a little bit.

I thought a racetrack, of course I knew nothing about it.

And then after we completed the racetrack and we finished, we had a few people work as a track manager that didn't fit the bill.

And he looked at me one day, he said, 'Why don't you manage this thing?'

And again, I looked at him, I said, 'I've never been to a racetrack before.'

He said, 'That doesn't matter, you can do it.'

So that's how I became track manager 20 years ago.

- Most people, this term of endearment, which we love, is the Augusta of Motorsport, and that's kind of what they call Barber Motorsports.

- [Narrator] In September, 2003, the 880 acre park with its world class 16 turn, 2.38 mile racetrack open to the public.

- If for one person, whether it's George Barber or any other human, to conclude that his objective matches what's here today is remarkable and it takes some real perseverance to start from scratch and put this on the ground.

- [Narrator] A great layout for a racetrack wasn't the only thing that made it excellent.

The surrounding scenery and environment were just as important in giving the track its character.

One company in particular fell in love with this character, Porsche.

(cars revving) - The track experience started in 2000.

Originally we rode at Atlanta Raceway and then eventually progressed to where we opened up programs down in Sebring Raceway in Florida, because we couldn't get enough dates of Road Atlanta, which kinda led to the idea of looking at another opportunity.

And then we heard about this track being built over in Birmingham.

So we said, what's that all about?

Started looking into it, came over, visited with folks from the Barber organization and saw their master plan and were very impressed.

And that was in middle of 2001 and things just kind of progressed.

We kept growing and needing more days.

And then finally the end of 2002, a decision was made by the management at Porsche to set up the program here at Barber.

And so in January of 2003, we were setting up and actually doing the launch of the Cayenne, which is Porsche's new SUV at the time, you know, right here with the public relations launch, as well as the dealer sales training launch, which was a great way to introduce the school here at Barber.

So we had a lot of people coming through, about 1600 people come through that program in January and February.

And these were all people associated with the dealerships so they were able to spread the word that we were here at Barber Motorsports Park.

- [Narrator] It had the garages and pit area of a typical racetrack, which supported the driving school and dealer sessions of Porsche.

- You look at Barber and the landscaping, the attention to detail, all of the infrastructure, I mean, everything about it is very representative of what Porsche represents in regards to quality and image.

So it's really the perfect fit.

And we knew that when we first started talking with the Barber organization 20 years ago, that this is gonna be a great opportunity.

You could see their master plan and everything that was promised has been delivered and then some.

I mean, it's just a really a great relationship and you really, you couldn't ask for anything more, you know, for each organization, you know, to benefit from this relationship.

- [Narrator] In addition to Porsche calling Barber Motorsports home to their driving experience, Mercedes-Benz also took a liking to the diversity of the track as part of their testing programs.

The Porsche driving experience was a highly sought after ticket.

And over the past two decades has generated a great deal of economic benefit for the Birmingham area.

- The museum and park generate economic impact in many different ways.

There are people from all over the world who come to visit the museum because it's the largest motorcycle museum in the world as certified by Guinness World Records.

So people come and they stay in hotel rooms.

People also come for the big events at the track.

The two biggest events each year are the IndyCar race in the springtime and the Barber Vintage Festival in the fall, which is the largest vintage motorcycle event in the country.

- Every year in October, well over 70,000 bike enthusiasts and designers and engineers come from all over the United States to celebrate one thing, Motorcycles.

- This is the pinnacle of the season.

The end of the season, the weather's usually just about to turn really cold and this is our last chance to come out and have a whole lot of fun.

- They're rattling, they're vibrating, they're air cooled, just a really visceral experience.

And there's no slipper clutches, no analog breaks, you're really feeling everything.

For every 20 minutes on the track, I'm probably spending five hours working on the bike and every go fast improvement is a whole slew of problems you gotta solve.

So if you like wrenching on old motorcycles, old engines, you know, it's a blast.

And then take it on the track and to see how the change you made impacted it, yeah, I love it.

(motorcycles revving) - Everything's running.

You smell the two stroke in the air and you hear the bikes on the track and everybody is talking bikes.

It is a great opportunity for us to bring everyone together.

- We're just so lucky that we actually get to go out and ride these bikes on this track.

- It's one of the largest vintage events in North America, so it worked out pretty good.

- And then you have the two largest customers of the Barber Park, which is Porsche and Mercedes.

Porsche has 15 driving schools around the world and their school here at Barber is the largest of those 15 schools.

So it's the largest Porsche school in the world.

They're on the track about 160 days a year, and 95% of the people that attend their events are from out of state.

And then Mercedes has a brand immersion experience program, which is where they bring in employees from all over the country each year for training, roughly I think about 6,000 employees a year.

And of course that generates hotel room usage.

On a typical year, roughly about $140 million of economic impact, roughly about 90,000 hotel room nights of usage per year.

If you add it up from the beginning when the park opened in 2003, the parks had more than 5 million visitors, the economic impact is more than two and a half billion dollars.

- [Narrator] It was this very economic impact that became an important factor for why George Barber, years ago envisioned this museum and racetrack.

- There's probably a number of reasons why the program is successful.

The museum is a big, big factor in that.

It's a world class facility and they spend all day on the track having a heck of a good time.

And at the end of the program, all the participants get to come here and visit the museum.

And you know, you have this amazing collection of cars and motorcycles and history and it really just ties in so well with the program.

And you know, Porsche has a lot of racing heritage.

And so again, it's just more of that connection.

We're on the track over 160 days a year as well.

So it's very, very busy and a lot of people getting to experience this incredible facility.

- [Narrator] The museum itself has to impress thousands of visitors from around the world.

The way motorcycles and race cars were displayed created a unique opportunity for visitors to get as close as possible with a 360 degree view of their artwork that was on display.

- While Mr. Barber was coming up with some of the thoughts and initial concepts, what the building would look like, it was very important to him that it had the nature part as part of the internal here.

So it's a glass building, it's concrete, it's glass, it's very minimalistic, it's these tiered levels, very similar to what was downtown when he was a child.

And really there's bikes and cars in every level, but then when you clad it in glass and stainless steel, you put it in the right position where the sunlight comes through on each side.

What's great about that is throughout the day that sunlight is really coming across and throughout different parts of the day, you're really seeing the same bike in a different light.

Mr. Barber had a lot of intention with how nature would affect the architecture of the building.

In 2014, there's roughly a thousand bikes, we were nominated and awarded the Guinness Book of World Records, largest motorcycle collection in the world.

Since then, we've grown and we're also the largest Lotus race car collection in the world, which is a point of pride for us, you know, not just say the quantity, but having the quantity of quality is really important to us.

It's huge.

(intense music) There's a lot of great pieces here, some wonderful exhibits as well.

We have pieces from the art of the motorcycle exhibit that was in the late nineties.

We have different types of racing, whether it's motocross, Supercross, early road racing, drag racing, all of these different pieces that kind of really teach you about the breadth and diversity of motors sports.

Barber Motorsport Park Racetrack was opened in 2001, originally as a demo track to test the living collection that we have here.

As our track expanded, so did the clientele and now we're world renowned facility where we have IndyCar, Porsche, Mercedes, and different track days on track at all times.

And it lends itself to this very diverse clientele.

You know, if we look at the demographics, roughly 47% are from Alabama, which leads a lot to people out of the state coming here traveling through and about 13% of that annual attendance is from out of country.

So every single day you have every walk of life.

You have someone from Sweden and Germany and Austria and Mexico City.

All of them are here in Birmingham and experiencing something for themselves in a unique location.

They're not thinking about Talladega in that sense.

It's this unique motor sports culture that really is international in essence.

(car revving) - [Narrator] Additionally, numerous automakers have chosen the park as their stage for vehicle debuts and the filming of their commercials.

The museum attracts such a wide range of people with a variety of interests.

One of those people was Brian Case.

- I arrived here at the Barber Museum 2004.

Like most people that hear about it, they quickly realize I need to go there, right, if you're into motor sports or you're a gearhead.

So I've always been a huge fan of Barber museum.

- [Narrator] Brian started working for the museum in 2019 and Heads the Barber Advance Design Center.

- So the Barber Advance Design Center is the newest edition to the museum in its unique in many ways, one of which is it shows this living exhibit.

So as you walk through the museum, you're looking at these polished, finished products, a motorcycle, a race car.

You're seeing years of development, but you're only seeing the end piece.

The design center is made specifically to show that process of pen to paper, clay modeling, advanced engineering and motorcycle production.

- I am an industrial designer, that's what I went to school for.

And I started thinking about two-wheeled vehicles partway through school.

When I graduated school, I started a company doing design work for clients and then had a client that was squarely in the motorcycle space.

And that's when my life changed.

- [Narrator] As an industrial designer, Brian became the co-founder and design director for Motus Motorcycles where he led the design and development of the MST V-4 sport tourer.

(bike revving) - I realized all of my schooling and all of my background to that point led me to motorcycle design.

Some of the abilities we have here in the design center, like laser scanning for instance, we have found ways to utilize this technology inside of the museum.

- [Narrator] And one department that benefits greatly from the museum's design center is their restoration department.

- You know, the way we look at our collection, we take each piece individually and we look at its story, right, where it lived in a moment in time.

So we look at restoration, preservation, and conservation.

And on any day, you're going to see all three of those in the museum.

So a restoration is full on top to bottom, nut and bolt, make it brand new, better than it looked when it was first made, real shiny, nice piece, you'll see those all over the place.

Preservation is kind of taking that new dirt off, leaving the old dirt on.

So, you don't want it to age anymore than it already is, but you still want to show its age.

You know, a hundred year old motorcycle, you don't always want it to look brand new.

Maybe you want it to look like it just came out of the barn.

Then there's conservation, which really are my favorites.

And that's taking a bike and putting it in an exact moment in time, particularly race bikes, right?

So generally a race bike will be custom made, hand-built for that day.

It'll be championed and probably destroyed and if not destroyed it'll be put inside a barn or a garage and it'll weather away with time.

Being able to find that bike and bring it to an exact moment in its life to show its best self, that's conservation and that's what we like to do here at the museum.

- Our restoration department is constantly sourcing parts for old motorcycles, old cars and they will approach each project the same way.

What do we have?

What do we need?

If it gets to the point where we just don't have enough information, we have to remake a part.

So when we talk about new tools that we can show here, AI is one of those tools and this is a part that was generated inside a software called Fusion 360 and it was 3D printed and it's a shape that can only be 3D printed.

It can't be made any other way 'cause of all the intricacies and undercuts.

So it has to be additively manufactured, like 3D printed.

If we have a part, an existing part, maybe it's deteriorated beyond repair, we can scan that and digitally rebuild it.

And so we've been able to introduce some of these technology tools here in the design center for those purposes.

- [Narrator] One major component of the vision of the museum was to offer educational opportunities to students.

- My role here at Barber is to run the education programs and those consist of field trips.

So school programs for third grade and up to high school.

Typically, I have one school program per day and most times this year I've had four or five schools come through each week.

- He used carbon fiber, which is a carbon polymer that can be woven into a thread and eventually into a weave like this and you can find-- - We're able to actually meet STEM standards for the teachers through the education programs.

- You bring students in from third grade to fifth grade or even high school and expose them to art, design, engineering, mathematics, physics, all of which motorcycles and race cars deal with constantly.

And it's not just how to move metal or restoration, it's why these pieces are important in a historical context.

- It's more about inspiring students through STEM, through the Motorsports Museum, through what we do well here at Barber, which of course is motorcycles and engineering and design.

So, we focus really heavily on the engineering design process and all of the aspects that go into that.

We like to introduce them to the additive and subtractive technologies that we have here in terms of manufacturing.

And then of course the 3D printing.

So we've had some 3D printing experiences here with high school engineering students and that's been really exciting too.

- [Narrator] They also have a build a bike program where students get to assemble and disassemble a PW50 motorcycle as part of the experience at the museum.

- So they're learning that building something is a process as well and they're able to get their hands on nuts and bolts.

Perhaps they've never had the opportunity to do that before.

So, we just give them a lot of hands-on experience.

- Being able to bring students in and teach them about that, teach them about the local history that comes with it, and then give them an ability to test out their own hypotheses and theories in our classroom is really important to us.

And you know, we're not trying to make every person that comes through here a motorcycle racer or a race car driver.

We want them to come and get a better appreciation for the design and engineering that went into these pieces so that they can leave and maybe be inspired to create their own next thing.

(students chattering) (engine revving) - This is all engineering.

Somebody made these.

And I think when young kids see this place and think, yeah, somebody at one time was my age and they got a vision that they would like to get involved in this world, it might encourage some young people to take more engineering classes when they get to college and see that you can be a part of this world.

- We really wanna be able to give back.

What we offer inside the museum is a lot of rich history of motorsports but our mission really is to take that outside the walls and give back mainly to our local community, but also to the world if possible.

- My name's Lee Clark.

I'm one of the regional old guys today.

Today, I'm the senior tech on the car side.

I stepped down a year and a half ago as senior manager of restoration and conservation because I wanted to slow down in life and enjoy it.

And I'm having a great time of working on some Porsche replicas that we're building.

When we first get a project to restore with car or bike, we evaluate it, see how original it is 'cause they're only original once.

We take it all apart and we try to figure out what needs to be replaced or rebuilt.

We'd rather rebuild stuff, try to keep it original, but sometimes that's not the case.

So, we go as far as making our own parts.

Sometimes we have to find new original parts and sometimes we buy replica parts.

But it's a process that we take very seriously to try to get the correct car or bike to represent the museum.

- Welcome to the Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum, home to the world's largest collection of motorcycles and of special interest to me, the world's largest collection of Lotus Motorcar.

Hello, I'm Clive Chapman.

My father, Colin Chapman founded the Lotus Mark.

In 1947, age 19 in London, England, he decided he wanted to modify a road car to go up a muddy hill faster than anybody else.

That led on to Lotus Cars winning Formula one World Championships, the Indy 500 and revolutionizing road cars for many years to come.

- We have 64 racing Lotus in the collection.

The very first one was a Lotus 21 that Mr. Barber bought with a motorcycle.

We got that first Lotus 21 and now we're up to 64 because we bought another one and another one and another one and look we've got the best collection in the world.

- And that led to Colin Chapman and Mike Costin deciding that they wanted a version which they could productionize and this was the Lotus Eleven.

More than 200 of these cars were manufactured and they achieved great success on the track in the hands of privateers, but also the watch cars.

Watch cars generally a little bit lighter, the chassis tube's even thinner.

And the body work, you gotta be careful where you push an Eleven because it is just so thin.

- While we found a lot of cars, one of our most interesting ones, the Lotus Eleven that was featured in the cover road track in 1957.

George Barber was 17 then, and this particular car was on the cover.

I got two phone calls on the same day about this car from opposite sides of the country.

Never do you get two phone calls that quick on anything but the same day.

So I scheduled a flight out there, it was in a garage in Seattle Heights and it had been inside that garage for 25 years.

So we made a deal and we brought it home and I tried to talk to Mr Barber about let's just conserve it.

And he said, if you don't put it back exactly like it is in that magazine, we're not buying it.

So I had the magazine, which had inside shots and all that, and we put it back exactly the way it was.

And I think it was, since he was 17, I don't think he was racing at that time, but it really got him into sports cars.

And of course, the early Lotus were sports cars and race cars so he remembers it very well.

So our Lotus collection is the largest Lotus race car collection in the world.

We have 64 Lotus race cars.

- When you come to the museum, we want you to see everything.

You don't come here as a Harley guy, only wanting to see our Harleys.

Yeah, we have 136 of them, so that's great.

You're going to see them, but they're not all in one corner of the museum.

They're spread amongst the 1,006 bikes you're going to see and that's by design.

We have over 22 countries represented in our collection.

Well over a thousand motorcycles on display and that span over 125 years of production from very early models of steam engine motorcycles to brand new electric motorcycles that are still being developed.

You're gonna see it all and that's by design.

- [Speaker] I mean, this place is, it's a stunning destination.

And unless you come here, you can't appreciate what is really here.

- [Speaker] This museum is here because it's where George's home is.

And he wanted to make a contribution to his own environment that would be beneficial to this community.

- [Narrator] The Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum is a showcase of the beauty and splendor of these timeless machines.

The racetrack is an engineering feat that has transformed racing in the South and has helped create a global attraction, bringing thousands to the Birmingham area.

The meticulously cared for grounds continued to be a striking display of beauty around the park.

The artwork displayed throughout the grounds has created a certain charm that's easily appreciated.

The Advanced Design Center continues to attract engineers and designers into its industry.

And the educational programs have opened the eyes of many young students to their own capabilities.

And it was all because of one man, George Barber, who in the 1960s decided that he would ride into history.

(intense dramatic music)