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There are Buckeye sports fanatics and then there are Buckeye fanatics. Larry Lokai, known to many as “Buckeyeman,” is both.
Lokai, an Urbana resident and Ohio State alumnus, collects and donates thousands of buckeyes from buckeye trees around Ohio each year in addition to being one of the Buckeyes’ most rabid and recognizable fans.
Lokai attended his first OSU football game when he was a freshman in 1962. He was a member of “Block O” during his junior and senior years and earned a degree in science in 1967 and returned to earn his master’s degree in 1973.
It would take 25 years for Lokai, now a retired educator, to become Buckeyeman. In 1998, he joined the animal sciences department at OSU as an adjunct faculty member and attended every Buckeye home game. However, he didn’t have tickets to the home Michigan game. His son got him a last-second ticket, but it wasn’t in preferred seating.
“I was stuck right in the Michigan section in the middle. I wore a jersey and my ‘skunk wig,'” Lokai said. “That was kind of the debut (of Buckeyeman).”
Since then, the fan with his trademark scarlet-and-gray wig, painted face and overloaded buckeye necklaces has become a well-known celebrity fan. Lokai began stocking up on the wigs, developing a routine and attending as many games as possible. He said he has been to every home game since 1999 and went to 70 straight games overall before breaking the streak by not going to games at Minnesota and Penn State this season. Being a celebrity fan has its perks, Lokai said.
“I had a press pass to be right with the team on the field before the National Championship Game in 2002,” Lokai said. “I got to rush out on the field with the players after the game. It was unreal; pandemonium.”
Once Lokai started to become a tenacious and popular fan, he started collecting buckeyes from about 100 buckeye trees in various Ohio counties, he said. After the buckeyes fall from the trees, he goes around and picks them up with a special “nut wizard tool” and then dries them on drying racks he built. He stores them in buckets that hold 1,000 buckeyes each and then donates them to fans, students and cheerleaders and also provides enough buckeyes for the entire freshman class to receive one at first-year orientation.
“It’s been a really nice thing to give everybody (a buckeye),” said Jenny Osborn, assistant director in undergraduate admissions and first year experience. “That is 8,000-plus buckeyes each year, which is an amazing amount.”
In addition to giving freshmen buckeyes at orientation since 2002, Lokai said he gives tens of thousands more to the university each year for OUAB and student projects.
“It puts a smile on my face, I get a lot of gratification out of it,” Lokai said of sharing his wealth of buckeyes. “It comes out of my pocket, but that’s my way of paying forward to the university.”
“It’s something he has embraced and is excited to do for students,” Osborn said. “The students still carry the buckeye they receive at orientation and that’s a nice legacy for somebody to leave.”
Lokai also makes and gives out thousands of buckeye necklaces each year and said he has gone through over 3,000 in the past year. Many wonder about all the necklaces he wears on Saturdays and at appearances; it is indeed an exact science. He wears seven necklaces for the football team’s seven national titles and wears 104 total buckeyes on the necklaces for each of the times OSU has played Michigan.
On Saturday home games in fall, Lokai wakes up at 4 a.m. to paint his face and get ready to make his rounds through the tailgaters and attend alumni functions around Ohio Stadium.
“I like to be like a light bulb switch,” Lokai said. “I try to walk into a place and light it up with positive energy. I look for the most people wherever I go and I always bring buckeyes.”
Matt Friedman can be reached at [email protected].
