Hakes Column: Unique neighborhood derby still thrills nearly 3 decades later

Joan Ochs remembers her late husband Don was no fisherman when they first moved to North Twin View Heights subdivision near Lake Macbride in 1968.

“In fact,” she told me, “when the neighbors gave him some fishing poles, he gave them away.”

But eventually, her charismatic spouse pulled down the sails on his sailboat, picked up a fishing rod and got – to coin a phrase – hooked on the sport.

And then, at the urging of his little neighborhood friend Kelley Wilkinson, age 12 at the time, the two agreed to launch something special together. They would teach kids to fish through an annual fishing event at the local pond.

Some three decades later, I got the chance to witness firsthand the legacy this partnership produced.  On Saturday morning two weeks ago, some 50 or so subdivision residents and their guests flocked to North Twin View Pond, where the annual Don Ochs Fishing Derby has grown into a fun and efficiently organized neighborhood event to be envied.

Around a pond ringed with kids and families, volunteer adult anglers rushed to bait hooks and remove anything caught – bass, bluegills, crappies, and catfish, not to mention the occasional heavy-duty snapping turtle. It was a hectic scene.

“The snappers sneak into the pond from the Coralville Reservoir which is close by,” said Joe Wilkinson, former DNR information specialist. “They are quite inhospitable, so we don’t want them around the kids, and we return any we catch to the reservoir.”

Wilkinson and his wife, Sue, the retired parents of Kelley, are the unofficial longtime ramrods of this annual rural Solon event, with lots of help from others, including their daughter Kaitlin Hall of Kalona.

“We’ve never been rained out in 29 years,” Sue proudly reported. “But it was ‘virtual’ during the Covid summer. We told the kids to fish on their own at the pond and send us a picture. When they did, we delivered a prize to them.”

Popularity has increased over the years

These days, the organizers get individual donations coming out of the blue to purchase quality prizes for almost everybody – rods, reels, minnow buckets, tackle, you name it -- with some businesses chipping in as well. There’s a little wading pool with plastic fish for the very small kids and hot dogs for everybody at noon.

When the smoke cleared at this summer’s event, 24 out of the 25 kids registered caught fish and all ended up with at least one nice prize for their efforts.

Other participants reveal the homespun popularity of the tradition.

Two-year-old Liam Dall could barely sit still long enough to hold a pole, but when Grandpa Dan Dall helped him land his bass, he raced around in circles with excitement. Dan’s wife Ann said they’ve lived next to the pond for 30 years and have enjoyed a ringside seat for this fun every summer, a tradition now passed on to the third generation.

“I remember one of our sons was two weeks old and in a stroller out here during the derby one year,” Ann said with a grin. “They gave him the sportsmanship award.”

Farther around the pond, eight-year-old Thea Kuennen concentrated furiously on her fishing while Dan Ochs, son of the founder who came from Milwaukee for the event, advised and encouraged her. Soon she had reeled in a bass which measured 11.5 inches at the registration desk.

Her mother Nicole told me she brought all four of her kids to the pond. “Thea is the quiet one, so it’s fun to get her in on the excitement,” she said. “We’re not a fishing family, but we like to do the derby.”

Ochs was a Iowa professor with a love of the outdoors

Sue Wilkinson said Don Ochs, well-known head of the rhetoric department at the University of Iowa, was wildly popular with the neighborhood kids. He mentored them in outdoor activities and recruited them to staff the elaborate haunted house he staged every October.

“He had a way of making every child feel special,” she recalled. “His loud, commanding voice might keep them at arm’s length at first, but not for long.”

The Ochs Derby co-founder Kelley is now Kelley Grothus, who lives in Madrid with a family of her own. She remembers Ochs as a grandfatherly figure with a deep, joyful laugh full of wildlife stories but who also taught life lessons to the neighborhood kids.

“He was more than just a cool neighbor,” she told me. “He taught us to be curious and wonder about the world around us. And everybody respected him.”

Following his death in January of 2012, the neighbors agreed the annual derby should continue with his name on it.

“Next year we’re hoping to make the 30th anniversary extra special,” said Sue Wilkinson.

There may be plenty of lunkers left for the fun next summer. The derby follows a “catch and release” policy.

Richard Hakes is a freelance writer for the Iowa City Press-Citizen and regularly contributes columns.

This article originally appeared on Iowa City Press-Citizen: Don Ochs Fishing Derby thriving behind 29-year history