Welcome home, Joe

Joe Redington Sr. finally came home Saturday afternoon.

The Father of the Iditarod is now keeping an eye on the race he helped create, thanks to a larger-than-life-sized sculpture and memorial erected outside the Iditarod Trail Committee headquarters on Knik-Goose Bay Road that was unveiled Saturday.

"My dad would be real proud of this," said Raymie Redington. "It means a lot to me, and to my family, to have this here."

The idea for the bronze sculpture was born by Bill Devine, a good friend of the Redingtons, during a memorial for Redington in 1999. Last year, however, the project really got rolling, leading up to Saturday's event.

For more than nine months, Devine and the Friends of Joe Redington Sr. organization raised the $35,000 needed for Cordova artist Joan Bugbee to sculpt the statue, and then have it bronzed and erected outside the headquarters. The result is an incredibly life-like statue of Redington holding Feets, one of his dogs. The pose -- with Redington's eyes fixed on the upcoming trail while Feets' glare is on the viewer -- has a special meaning to Raymie Redington.

"I ran Feets in the 1974 Iditarod, so it means a lot to me to see my dad and that dog up there," Raymie Redington said.

Devine said he was happy with the way the project turned out, particularly because of the detail of the sculpture.

"Today is Joe Redington's day, and it's like we are looking at him, right in the face," Devine said.

At the ceremony, Iditarod Trail Committee Executive Director Stan Hooley talked about how influential Redington was to the Iditarod, and how far the race has come since it began in 1974.

"It's a very special day for two families -- the Redington family and the Iditarod family, which, in many ways, is one big extended family, together," Hooley told the crowd. "Without Joe, and his grit and his determination, there simply wouldn't be an Iditarod today. His influence goes on today."

Hooley said Redington embodied the Iditarod spirit, and he has passed that spirit on to the hundreds of men and women who have gone on to run the race. A little part of Redington is with every musher on the trail to Nome.

"He loved the Iditarod, he loved sled dogs, he loved mushing, and he loved the people who lived that lifestyle," Hooley said.

Vi Redington, Joe's widow, said that despite the cold and blustery weather, the day meant the world to her family.

"It's a cold day to us, but it would have been a warm day for Joe," Vi Redington said. "It's nice that my family is here to appreciate this."

Saturday would have been Redington's 86th birthday. He passed away in June, 1999.

Throughout his life, he was dedicated to not only sled dog racing, but also to Alaska in general.

"He wasn't content with just the Iditarod race," Devine said last summer, when the idea was born. "He was so important in getting the Iditarod Trail recognized as a state trail, and then a National Historic Trail. He did more for the ecology of Alaska than any other group has.

"Let's say the Iditarod ends today, and they don't hold another race ever. That trail -- from Seward to Nome, with both the Northern Route and the Southern Route -- would still be a National Historic Trail," Devine said. "That's pretty impressive."

It's hard to find someone associated with the Iditarod who didn't call Joe a friend. The Cordova artist who sculpted the memorial didn't get the chance to meet Redington in person, but she said she has a connection to him now.

"I never got to meet him, but I feel like he really is a good friend of mine after this," Bugbee said Saturday. "I feel I've looked into his eyes many times."

Also at the ceremony, there was one special presentation, that, just like the unveiling of the memorial, was years overdue.

Iditarod Trail Committee president Rick Koch then presented Vi Redington with a lifetime membership to the Iditarod Trail Committee.

"We were surprised to learn that Vi has been mailing her membership in every year and that she wasn't a life member," Koch said. After presenting her with a plaque and Iditarod memorabilia given to life members, he had one more thing to mention to Vi Redington. "Now you don't have to mail $35 every year," he said with a chuckle.

Saturday was a big day for the Redingtons, as the unveiling of the memorial statue came just hours after the Knik 200 Joe Redington Sr. Memorial race began on Knik Lake.

If Redington were alive today, he probably wouldn't have cared for all the commotion of the day, because he would have his thoughts set on the first weekend in March, when the race he helped found begins.

"My boy, Ray, is running this year," Raymie Redington said. "Last year he finished 14th, and we're hoping he moves up again this year. That would make my dad as proud as the statue."

Redington's last Iditarod was 1997, when he finished 36th. That year he was honored by being given bib number one, a bib that is ceremoniously given to the honorary mushers, and not a musher in the race.

Normally, mushers bibs start with number two, and they are assigned based on a drawing. In 1997, Redington was given the first bib.

He ran 19 Iditarods, finishing as high as fifth four times.

Ironically, the man most identified with the Iditarod never won the race.

In his first Iditarod, the inaugural 1974 race, he finished 11th, which was good for $465 in prize money.

In 1988 and 1989, he was voted as the most inspirational musher on the trail.