"These ducks
were really fun to see around town and I'm glad this one got a makeover to
greet people at the airport." Jeanne P... (That's Jeanne peeking out from
behind the duck.) 
Have barrel-chested fiberglass duck — will travel.
Eugene Airport employee Jon Ballew said he’s done more than a few odd tasks in his work, but Thursday was the first time he’d ever relocated a 6-foot-tall duck.
“This is my first (duck) transport,” said Ballew, who was wearing a green-and-yellow University of Oregon stocking cap as he helped load and strap down the newly christened Track Town USA Duck in Donna Briggs’ Bethel-area driveway. “And I’m appropriately dressed for it.”
As passing motorists looked on in wonder, Ballew and fellow airport employee Loretta Sells delivered the transformed mallard to the airport to serve as an official greeter for the upcoming U.S. Olympic Track & Field Trials in Eugene.
“This is my first duck rescue, but it’s an important one,” joked Linda Wheatley, initiator of the Ducks on Parade civic art project that saw the creation of 52 of the big fiberglass ducks — which raised almost $200,000 for local charities when they were auctioned off to businesses and individuals — between 2002 and 2004.
This new red, white and blue duck recently underwent an extreme makeover. In a past life, it was known as Ritz Quacker — a sparkling golden duck created by Christina Brown — and spent several years at the corner of Broadway and Pearl Street outside Zenon Cafe in downtown Eugene.
But exposure to the elements had caused damage to its beak and feet. When Wheatley saw it about a month ago, she wondered if its owner, Broadway & Pearl Associates, a consortium of businesses by the intersection, was going to spruce it up for the Trials.
Discovering there was no plan to do so, Wheatley asked the consortium if it would donate the duck for a new cause. With an affirmative answer, she called Briggs, who had painted six of the original ducks, to do the transformation. Repair work was donated by Mike Stoffel of Trackside Boat Repair, and Forrest Paint donated the new colors.
Briggs painted the duck yellow with a white breast, gave it red, white and blue stripes around its head, a red, white and blue ribbon around its neck that holds a gold medallion, blue track shorts and red and white track shoes.
“It still has its original eyes,” Wheatley said Thursday. “The golden duck is still in here somewhere, don’t you think?”
After checking with marketing manager Cathryn Stevens at the airport, Wheatley got the OK to deliver Track Town USA Duck on Thursday.
“I’ve always wanted a greeter at the airport,” Wheatley said of Ducks on Parade, some of which can still be found at area businesses and in local homes. Dead Duck, patterned after the late Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead, was even purchased and shipped to an art collector in Washington, D.C.
“With the Trials coming up I thought it would be a great time,” said Wheatley, standing at the airport with her husband, Steve, and her sister and brother-in-law, Kaye and Herb Eggleston, who are visiting from Indianapolis.
Track Town USA Duck was placed next to the information booth in the airport terminal, where it quickly got hugs and its photograph taken with a family about to board a flight out of town.