Wylie, New Year’s icon in Ohio town, gets $4K makeover

Associated Press

PORT CLINTON, OHIO

An iconic 600-pound fiberglass Walleye used to ring in the new year in a northwest Ohio city is getting a $4,000 face-lift.

Wylie the Walleye, measuring about 20-feet across, takes a nosedive from the sky each Dec. 31 at midnight in the Lake Erie town of Port Clinton. Besides participating in the Walleye Drop, the fish attends festivals, parades and the county fair and provides a backdrop for tourist photos at his year-round home on a trailer outside a hotel.

He’ll also make an appearance at a tailgate party for the Toledo Walleye minor league hockey team when they host the Chicago Express on Oct. 15.

Don Clemons, chairman of the Walleye Madness at Midnight Committee calls the fish “an ambassador for Port Clinton.”

“Over the years he’s really gotten beat up,” Clemons told The (Fremont) News-Messenger.

“And he doesn’t have any health insurance, he’s just supported by our nonprofit group.”

Clemons jokes that the first is undergoing surgery for the hardships he’s faced over the years.

“He had skin cancer and reconstructive surgery,” Clemons said. “In walleye years, he’s 110 years old.”

Wylie recently had his gills and scales touched up with a water-based paint by taxidermist Jim Wendt who created the mascot with Kevin Pietras of Coastal Marine II.

“He’s basically designed like an airplane with a wooden frame inside and with fiberglass over top,” said Wendt as he worked on the restoration inside a bay at Coastal Marine, where Wylie hung from a hoist.

“When we built him we had no idea he was going to be in operation this long,” Wendt said.