With about two hours to spare in Alaska's most famous fishing derby and plenty on the line -- family bragging rights and the pride of the 60-year-old Seward Silver Salmon Derby -- Jerry Bixby raced from his boat to the harbor Sunday morning hauling a fish so fresh it was still flopping.
"He's running up the ramp and the fish is still kinda wiggling and his wife Loretta is running behind him … and he says, 'Hurry, hurry, it's bleeding!' " said Cindy Clock of the Seward Chamber of Commerce. "He was totally grinning."
Bixby, 64, hooked the winning fish in the final hours of the nine-day derby to become the second two-time champion in history. Until Sunday, that honor belonged solely to Jerry's brother Bill.
Bixby's 16.19-pound silver gives the Bixby family of Soldotna five derby champions -- Loretta was the 1983 winner -- and solidifies the clan's reputation as derby dominators.
"I'd like to say it's skill and secret lures and all that," Bixby said Sunday afternoon. "It's perseverance. It's fishing 10 to 12 hours a day. If your line's in the water, there's more of a chance.
"And to be honest, it's a little bit or a whole lot of luck, though I'd never admit that to my brother or another fisherman."
Bixby's catch spared the derby from recording its smallest winning fish in history.
No fish weighing less than 15 pounds has ever prevailed in Seward, but until Bixby showed up two hours before Sunday's noon deadline, Kelly Landry of Kenai was poised to win with a 14.92-pounder caught on Aug. 9.
"I told him 'Thank you for saving our derby,' " Clock said. "Valdez, Homer, everybody was like, '14.9? What kind of a winner is that?' "
Bixby spared the derby that indignity. He collected $10,000 for his winner, leaving Landry with the second-place prize of $5,000. Third place went to Soldotna's Raymond Ansel with a 14.39-pound silver caught Friday.
It's been 15 years since a Bixby has won the derby. Two years after Loretta became the family's first champion with a 16.09-pound fish, Jerry won with a 19.01-pounder. Bill won in 1992 (19.19 pounds) and again in 2000 (20.14 pounds).
For many years the Bixbys were derby regulars who fished from opening day to closing day. Along with some fishing buddies from Soldotna, they used to show up wearing satin jackets emblazoned with the words "Soldotna Mafia," a nod to their habit of winning prizes. Jerry's prowess was such that a couple of friends started calling him the Godfather.
In recent years, Bixby hasn't had time to fish the derby as much as he used to, but he retired from his North Slope job with BP this spring.
He and Loretta spent the duration of the derby sleeping near the fishes. They camped at the Bear Creek campground and rose early every day to take out their boat, the Retta K, in search of Resurrection Bay's famed cohos.
Early on the derby's first day, Loretta caught a 3.8-pounder and rushed it to derby headquarters to claim the $100 prize awarded to the first fish of the derby.
The couple caught loads of cohos in the days that followed but released most of them.
"There's a lot of small fish this year and a whole bunch of humpys, 12- to 14-inches," Bixby said. "We were constantly reeling up something, not that that's a bad thing, but they (were) 7 to 8 pound ones."
The Bixbys decided to fish the head of the bay on Saturday and Sunday, a decision that paid off early Sunday when Loretta caught a fish that weighed nearly 13 pounds.
Then around 9:30 or 10, Jerry made the winning fish an offer it couldn't refuse.
"I'd been doing very well with a white squid behind a flasher," he said, "but a humpy got it so I put on a pink one and the big fish got it."
The biggest fish in derby history is the 22.24-pounder caught by Cooper Landing's Shirley Baysinger in 2002.
Bixby said he was hopeful another big silver was lurking, even though he had little reason to believe so.
"I've been talking to a few of the guys about how small the fish are overall," he said. "Some friends of mine went out yesterday and they caught and released 23 and not a one of them over 10 pounds. They're just running smaller for some reason.
"You look at the history and there's never been a 14-pound winner. I saved that from happening."
The silvers may have been smaller this year, but there were lots of them.
Clock said anglers entered 1,861 silvers weighing a total of 13,626 pounds -- an average weight of 7.36 pounds. The total weight was about 1,000 more pounds than last year, she said.
2015 Seward Silver Salmon Derby
Overall winners
1. Jerry Bixby, Soldotna, 16.19 pounds
2. Kelly Landry, Kenai, 14.92
3. Raymond Ansel, Soldotna, 14.39
4. Bob Stinson, Anchorage, 14.15
5. Steve Szymanski, Anchorage, 13.91
6. Glenda Frost, Anchorage, 13.55
7. Brian Van Baggen, McMinnville, Oregon, 13.54
8. Lindsay Yassick, Eagle River, 13.49
9. Roger Day, Minnesota, 13.42
10. (tie) Ron Eglody, 13.36, Howard Lazar, 13.36
Biggest fish caught from a sailboat -- Steven Normand, 11.97
Biggest fish caught from shore -- West Oetinger, 8.99
Youth champion --- Lucas Brockman, 13.3
Cumulative weight champion -- Richard Schmidt 402.31 pounds (Seward division); Tony Shandy 388.23 (non-Seward winner)