[UPDATED with Weekly Role in Discovery:] George P. Shultz's Head is Found in Trash, But Ronald Reagan's is Still Missing

UPDATE, DEC. 13, 12:22 P.M.: The recyclables searcher who found the head of George P. Shultz in a Huntington Beach garbage bin told his son in Oregon about the find, which led junior to search the Internet and find the OC Weekly Navel Gazing blog post on the former secretary of state's missing noggin, according to Chapman University officials. “We theorize that your story, plus our Public Safety officers contacting
all local metal recycling facilities, might have made the busts too 'hot' to sell or recycle, so perhaps the thief or thieves finally just
trashed them,” relates university spokeswoman Mary Platt in an email.
]

As we reported this morning, the bronze bust of Ronald Reagan that was snatched off a podium on campus the same day as Shultz's remains missing, and a new one has been commissioned. However, we misreported that a new Shultz bust was essentially in limbo. According to Platt, busts of both GOP warhorses were commissioned, and with the return of Shultz's, Chapman now has two.

“The elderly gentleman who found the bust is on disability and collects
recycling to add to his income,” Platt reports.

Public Safety officials, who went to pick the Shultz head up from the fellow in Huntington Beach, have not yet released his name, pending his permission. But Chapman will present him his $250 reward in person Friday, Platt said.

Meanwhile, would-be bronze-natchers would be wise to know that, since the head-nappings, the university has stepped up security on the remaining busts and other artwork displayed on campus, “with comprehensive camera coverage, more patrols, and security devices on each piece (can't go into detail, obviously),” the spokeswoman notes.

Others depicted in Chapman's “gallery of busts,” which is the way the university honors funders of endowed chairs annually–by letting that individual, family, organization or foundation select a renowned figure representing the field of study supported by their gift–include everyone from Ella Fitzgerald and Martin Luther King Jr. to Ayn Rand and Margaret Thatcher.  

Chapman currently has 33 endowed chairs and 22 endowed professorships. A list of the year, 20 bust subjects and endowed chairs follow after the jump . . .
[

1994 — Martin Luther King, Jr. – The Delp-Wilkinson Chair in Peace Studies

1996 — George Washington –  The Henry Salvatori Professorship in American Values and Traditions and the Henry Salvatori Professorship in Law and Community Service

1996 — Adam Smith – The Fletcher Jones Chair in International Business and Economics

1998 – Ella Fitzgerald – The Bertea Family Chair in Music

1998 – Paolo Friere (education theorist) – The Jack H. and Paula A. Hassinger Chair in Education

1999 – Cecil B. DeMille (film director) – The Marion Knott Filmmaker in Residence Endowed Chair in Dodge College of Film and Media Arts

2000 – Abraham Lincoln – The Donald P. Kennedy Chair in Law

2000 – A.P. Giannini (founder of Bank of America) – The Ralph W. Leatherby Chair in Entrepreneurship

2001 – Milton Friedman (Nobel laureate in economics) – The James L. and Lynne P. Doti Chair in Economics

2004 – James Madison – The William P. Foley II Chair in Corporate Law and Taxation

2005 – Fahmy Attallah, Ph.D. (psychologist and poet) – The Donna Ford Attallah '61 and Fahmy Attallah, Ph.D. Endowed Chair in Church Relations

2005 – Elie Wiesel (Holocaust survivor, author, Nobel Peace Prize laureate) – The Stern Chair in Holocaust Education

2006 – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart – The Robert and Norma Lineberger Chair in Music

2006 – R.C. Hoiles (president of Freedom Newspapers) – The R.C. Hoiles Chair in Business Ethics and Free Enterprise

2007 – Ronald Reagan – The Edgar and Elizabeth Pankey Chair in Media Arts

2008 – Giacomo Puccini (opera composer) – The Sebastian Paul and Marybelle Musco Chair in Italian Studies

2009 – Fra Luca Pacioli (the “father of accounting”) – The Jerrold A. Glass Chair in Accounting and Economics

2009 – Ayn Rand – The Rebecca and William Dunn Distinguished Chair in Economic Science in Honor of Vernon L. Smith

2009 – Margaret Thatcher – The George H.W. Bush Chair in International Business

2010 – George P. Shultz – The Donald Bren Distinguished Chair in Business and Economics

ORIGINAL POST, DEC. 13, 8:25 A.M.: The head of George P. Shultz was found in a Huntington Beach garbage bin.

Meanwhile, Ronald Reagan's noggin is still missing, but a new one is being made.

This is not the plot for an episode of Futurama,
but the state of matters related to busts being lopped off their
podiums and stolen from Chapman University in Orange this past summer.

As we reported in August . . .

• Ronald Reagan and George P. Shultz Heads Missing from Chapman U

. . . busts depicting the GOP warhorses were stolen, and university officials were unsure at the time if they were taken by someone trying to earn political points or to earn quick cash from scrap metal. Bronze busts are donated by wealthy benefactors of the private university, and the cost to unveil one along campus walkways can approach $10,000 once the sculptor is paid.

Campus security checked surveillance video but found no evidence exposing the head hunters. So, new busts were commissioned. But a Huntington Beach man looking through a garbage bin for
recyclables found the bust of Shultz, wrapped in newspaper inside an apple crate.

As the Orange County Register reports, the man's family in Oregon searched the Internet and
discovered the university was missing Shultz's head. Campus security fetched the bust, and the university plans to pay a $250 finder's fee.

Plans are still under way to replace the Gipper's head. The university had not planned to get to the former secretary of state until some time after that unveiling. Now, reattachment surgery is planned instead.

The university had already commissioned new Reagan and Shultz busts. On with their heads!