Andrea Gurke caught her personal-best muskie on June 16 on a daughter-father outing on Lake Galena. The 43-inch tiger muskie came on the fourth cast of a 5 1/2-inch Storm 360GT swimbait made by Gurke, 26, who works at Illinois Masonic Hospital.

“Andrea and I have been doing a father-daughter fishing trip with Tom Saccomanno, a childhood friend of mine from Galena, for three years,” her father Bob emailed. “Last year, we were totally skunked, but the year before she caught her first musky that measured 31 inches. All she prayed for was something closer to 40 inches.

“She got her wish, a 43-inch fish that didn’t want to come in the boat. The fight of her life that she won’t soon forget. And neither will l. Perhaps a memory of a lifetime for both of us.”

She caught and released another 40-inch tiger the same day.

FOTW, the celebration of big fish and their stories (the stories matter, as this one shows) around Chicago fishing, runs Wednesdays in the paper Sun-Times.

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