“Lord Marmaduke, Keira Mendez with Variety. You’ve become a household name across three languages and two species. Your household is part soap opera, part political dynasty, and your social reach rivals corporate governments.
My question is this: Do you see yourself as a leader, a symbol, or a character? And how much of this—tonight, the Freehold, your presence—is still real… and how much is now performance?”
“Let me answer in reverse order. This is the third major event I’ve had the pleasure park decked out for this year. While I have parts of it open year-round, I don’t usually have this many events until the end of June. Granted, until now, they were smaller affairs catering to around 25,000 people for the day—not one hundred and fifty thousand between 3:00 p.m. and dawn tomorrow. On an average summer evening, the park gets about 2,000 visitors during the week and as many as 5,000 on weekends.
Am I a leader, a symbol, or a character? Yes.”
“All three. A destination—because people deserve joy. A memory engine—because shared traditions keep communities alive.
But mostly? It’s proof that you don’t need a government to build civilization. You just need people who want to stay—and a reason to show up again tomorrow.
For 300 years, Freeholders have reshaped this park. It started as my ancestor’s deluded idea of a private golf course. Then came the Collapse, and golf stopped mattering.
His son built a putt-putt course and a swimming pool—for the locals, for his kids. His son built the first go-kart track. His grandson built the first ballfield. His daughter added the volleyball courts.
My first contribution was the ice rink—for my late wife, Amy. She was a California girl, and her first Missouri winter she fell in love with skating.
Last year, I upgraded all the baseball diamonds to Little League World Series standards.
So yes—this is about rebuilding civilization. But also? It’s about making sure the next kid gets to skate with the girl he loves, too.”
(pause)
“Did you see the Shinto shrine?”
“Yes. Beautiful. Seemed authentic.”
“There’s no ‘seemed’ about it. My grandfather built it for his mother—she was from Kyoto. My cousin Gary keeps it. He’s our chief groundskeeper and a Shinto priest. A few times a year, we rent out the whole park to outsiders who want a traditional wedding at the shrine. There are only three places on this continent you can do that now. This is one of them.”
