The Boy from Pantops: A Tribute to Alex Hansen (1942–2025)

Alex Hansen died on January 14, 2025. He was 82 years old.

Alex was the youngest of Oskar Hansen’s six children—born in Charlottesville, Virginia, in the spring of 1942 to Oskar and his third wife, Mary.

He was also the last living person with childhood memories of Oskar, and the only person still alive who had helped his father with sculpting work.

Kar, Oskar, and baby Alex, with their dog Nofrit at Pantops, circa 1943. (Photo courtesy of Alex Hansen).

A Spirit of Adventure

Pantops Mountain, where Alex grew up, sits just east of Charlottesville and was once part of Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello estate. Oskar bought the mountain in 1936, using the proceeds of his Hoover Dam sculpture commission.

The property became both home and studio to Oskar and his family, with ongoing construction projects for over 30 years.

Alex was Oskar’s second child with Mary, and twelve years younger than his older brother, Kar.

Alex grew up largely outdoors, instilling a life-long spirit of adventure. His childhood stories included being chased off the mountaintop by a moonshiner with a shotgun, dangling over a ravine while swinging on a vine, spending whole days hiking down the mountain and into town with a nickel in his pocket to buy a Coca-Cola. He remembered the time his parents were chased up the road by a bear while wearing formal attire on their way home from a gala.

Oskar and Mary in formal wear with Alex at Pantops, circa 1950. (Photo courtesy of Alex Hansen).

The Child Mechanic

Beyond his wilderness adventures at Pantops, Alex also sparked a life-long passion for auto mechanics while helping his dad repair water pumps, generators, tractors, and the family's 1940s Willys Jeep.

Oskar was in his 50s by the time Alex was born, and in the thick of his artistic career. He wasn’t known as an easy man. He had a strong temper, was often gone, and carried himself with the kind of intensity that didn’t leave much room for softness. But Alex seems to have escaped the worst of it. The two of them connected over physical work—projects, tools, repairs. That rhythm stayed with Alex the rest of his life. His earliest memories were of machines. Later, when telling a story, he would often begin not with the year but with the make and model of the car the family owned at the time.

Alex at Hoover Dam in 1956 (Photo courtesy of Alex Hansen).

In 1958, Oskar and Mary divorced. Alex, then sixteen, moved to California with his mother. He only returned to visit his father and Pantops a couple of times before Oskar died in 1971.

As a young adult, Alex opened an auto shop. He raced cars. He got married—five times in total—and had children and stepchildren across several households. He loved music and dancing. He took pleasure in small comforts and especially in mechanical things. His childhood work as a tinkerer and repairman gave him a core belief that he could build or fix anything.

By the time I met Alex, he was living in Erie, Pennsylvania, near his daughter Lori and her family.

Alex and Alex Jr. in 1970. (Photo courtesy of Alex Hansen).

His final wife, Joan, had passed away years earlier, and he was doing his best to stay active despite a string of health challenges. He still drove Uber for extra money. He had a garage full of tools for projects he fully intended to do some day. He had a broken down RV in the backyard, another project for sometime soon.

When I would call him with questions about his dad or his childhood memories, he mostly wanted to tell me about his most recent doctor's visit, his new medication protocols, or the next tinkering project he intended to start any day now.

But if a memory about his mom surfaced, or a story from Pantops found its way out, his voice would shift. He was sentimental and prone to tears in a way I don't think he even realized.

Reconnections

Alex often told me how amazed he was at the things I’d managed to find in my research.

In 2020, I helped facilitate a reunion between Alex and his daughter Donna, whom he hadn’t seen in nearly 50 years.

A year later, I visited him in Erie and helped him sort through boxes of childhood photos and artifacts—many of which hadn’t been touched in decades.

Alex locates the site of his vine-swinging ravine during his final visit to Pantops in 2022. (Photo by Aaron Street).

The following year, in 2022, Alex, his daughters Lori and Donna, and his grandson Reese, and I traveled to Charlottesville.

It was Alex's first time back at Pantops in more than 50 years. So much had changed there, and his childhood memories were so vague, that he spent the first two days of our visit absolutely convinced that we'd taken him to the wrong place. Eventually we were able to point out subtle landmarks he remembered, including finding the ravine, still covered in vines, that he'd swung on as a boy.

Also on that trip to Charlottesville, I was able to locate Alex's half-sister Beatrice—Oskar's daughter from his first marriage— who was then 99 years old and living nearby. Alex and Beatrice met for the first and only time that week.

A Quiet Legacy

Alex didn’t talk much about what those reunions meant, but they clearly meant something.

Though Alex had complicated relationships in his life with ex-spouses, kids, and step-children—not unlike his own father's complex legacy—he left some surprising bonds.

Alex, age 80, meets his sister Beatrice, age 99, for the first time in 2022. (Photo by Aaron Street).

After his death, I heard from Donna how remarkable it was that—despite Alex's estrangements and divorces and missing years—that his five daughters and step-daughters had found each other and built bonds that would last.

I don’t think Alex ever thought much about his own legacy. He was always looking forward, always planning another fix, another project. He didn’t seem to believe he’d ever run out of time. One of the last things he said to me was, "I'd much rather die of doing too much than too little." And so he kept going until the very end, driving his final Uber ride just two days before he died.

A life built around cars from start to finish.

I'm sad that my last connection to living memories of Oskar is gone, but I'm grateful for all the stories Alex let me capture.

Alex died a few months ago, but today would have been his 83rd birthday, so it seemed like a fitting time to write this tribute.

Alex's half-sister, Beatrice—the last of Oskar Hansen's children—also died this spring, just after celebrating her 102nd birthday! I'll be following up with a tribute to Beatrice shortly.