Jurustic Park

One of the massive steel dragons. Jim on Flickr (Creative Commons)

Curated by a former attorney, the fantastical metal menagerie known as Jurustic Park explores the extinct fauna of a Wisconsin marshland that never was.

Self-described “amateur paleontologist” Clyde Wynia was once a working lawyer but now he spends his days creating whimsical fantasy creatures from pieces of rusted scrap metal and other junk. Wynia has created near 1000 pieces of welded wildlife that he refers to as archeological finds from the area’s lost “Iron Age” (get it?). The collection includes towering metal works such as a handful of enormous rusted dragons, moderately large pieces such as the hobbits outside his wife’s art studio, and small works such as iron snails that could fit in the palm of a hand. Each and every piece has a name and story to go along with it such as Oxide the Watchdog, Porky-Pine the Half-Pig-Half-Porcupine, and Abe Lawbender the lawyer from Shysterville. Equal parts sculpture garden and charlatan’s paradise, the park offers a unique vision of the past as one man would have liked it.

Know Before You Go

Four miles north of Marshfield. Turn off Hwy 97 onto Hwy E on the north edge of Marshfield. Go north past Menards 3.5 miles to Old Sugarbush Lane for .5 miles until sculptures appear on the right. Jurustic Park is open throughout the year (email [email protected] to check seasonal hours) when Wynia will tell visitors the half-true stories of each piece if they are interested.