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Marblehead, Ohio: Giant-Handed Jacque

32-foot-tall Jacque, with his pencil mustache and paper hat, used to hold a tray of food. At some point he lost his tray and both hands. He received new, giant hands in 2022.

Visitor Tips and News About Giant-Handed Jacque

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Handless Jacques.

Big Man In Town

There's a big man holding a platform on East Harbor Rd, Lakeside.

[Lela, 09/27/2017]

None other than "Handless Jacques."

Handless Jacques.

Big Chef

I saw Big Chef while on a trip to Cleveland. He looks a lot like a Muffler Man, but not the typical Paul Bunyan.

[Kayley, 07/27/2014]

The big chef is known to most in Marblehead as "Handless Jacques," although recent research by Timothy Brian McKee (2015) suggests that Jacques in fact lies in ruins in an Ohio field. This statue is a copy of similar vintage to Jacques, and it also lost its hands.

Jacques.

Jacques Statue - Vague Recollections

The Jacques statue was at a sandwich shop on Lexington Ave in Mansfield, Ohio in 1971.

[Daniel Mainzer, 03/22/2009]

Jacques.

Handless Jacques

Jacques is a 30 foot high fiberglass "giant" that was transported to Marblehead in the early 1970s. Before that, Jacques was erected on Mt. Vernon Avenue in Marion Ohio for "Jacques Sandwich Shoppe," a fast food deli type restaurant that only was open about year or two before a fire damaged the place in 1969/70. Anyway, Jacques remained in the front yard of the closed restaurant, surrounded by weeds, etc. before he was loaded onto a flatbed truck and moved to Marblehead.

Two things about Jacques: First, the reason why he has no hands is because when he was built Jacques carried a tray in front of him with an enormous sandwich on it. When he was moved, the sandwich which was cast with his hands as one unit, was replaced by a "sign" that he "carried".

Secondly, the majority of people who remember Jacques are kids born in the 1950s and early 1960s -- he scared the living daylights out of us -- even more so when the place started to get run down. Kids remember things like that.

Wendy's International opened its first Marion hamburger restaurant on the site of the old Jacques Sandwhich Shoppe in Marion and continues to operate out of that heavily remodeled building.

[Ed Beavers, 05/07/2007]

Handless Jacques.

Handless Jacques

He is currently standing in a vacant lot adjacent to a gas station on the South side of SR 163 just East of East harbor State Park as of 3/17/07.

[Bruce Morrison, 03/30/2007]

Giant-Handed Jacque

Address:
6020 E. Harbor Rd, Marblehead, OH
Directions:
On the south side of OH-163/E. Harbor Rd, just east of a gas station and the stoplight at OH-269/N. Buck Rd.
RA Rates:
Worth a Detour
Save to My Sights

Nearby Offbeat Places

Fierce Lake Erie SharkFierce Lake Erie Shark, Port Clinton, OH - 3 mi.
Big Statue of AtlasBig Statue of Atlas, Put-in-Bay, OH - 7 mi.
World's Third Longest BarWorld's Third Longest Bar, Put-in-Bay, OH - 8 mi.
In the region:
Underground Railroad Tracks, Oberlin, OH - 35 mi.

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