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    • American Pickers star Mike Wolfe held Frank Fritz's hand before his death
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    American Pickers star Mike Wolfe held Frank Fritz's hand before his death

    Kathleen William Posted on

    When Frank Fritz took his last breath on Monday, September 30, his best friend held his hand and told him he loved him.

    According to People Magazine, Mike Wolfe, Fritz's co-star on the hit History Channel show “American Pickers,” was at Fritz's side when he died.

    “I got the call that he wasn’t feeling well. I just feel blessed that I was able to get there,” Wolfe said in an interview with PEOPLE magazine. “I was there for about an hour before he died and I held his hand and rubbed his chest as he took his last breath. I took my fingers and closed his eyes.”

    “I just told him that I wasn’t mad at him and that I loved him and that he was so important to me,” Wolfe told PEOPLE. “And then when I saw that he was having problems, I just said, 'Just go find your mother. Go look for her immediately. Just go look for her.'”

    More: Motorcycle Ride to Commemorate Spring Honoring Fan Favorite Frank Fritz of “American Pickers”

    Fritz's health deteriorated after a stroke

    Fritz, a Bettendorf native, had been in poor health since his stroke more than two years ago. According to friends, the complications aggravated his severe Crohn's disease.

    Fritz died in Davenport at the age of 60.

    “I've known Frank for more than half of my life and what you saw on TV was always what I saw: a dreamer as sensitive as he was funny,” Wolfe wrote in an Instagram post the day after Fritz's death. “Just as much behind the camera as in front of it, Frank had the opportunity to reach the hearts of so many people just by being himself.”

    PEOPLE reported after Fritz's stroke in 2022 that he and Wolfe met again and “spoke openly and very lovingly about everything I ever wanted to say to him,” Wolfe told PEOPLE.

    “He was a beautiful, beautiful human being who, to be honest, if there had never been a show, who knows what our lives would have been like,” Wolfe told PEOPLE. “I just want people to know who he was.”

    More: Where can I find the obituary for Frank Fritz? “American Pickers” is dedicating a new show in his honor

    Fritz and Wolfe were lifelong friends, growing up together and harvesting together

    American Pickers first aired in 2010, although Fritz and Wolfe had known each other long before then – they were best friends in middle school.

    They all grew up with single mothers in Bettendorf.

    Before they became household names, Fritz and Wolfe searched the surrounding alleys and the town's weed-overgrown junkyard for small treasures: cigar boxes, old signs, broken toys. They wanted to bring to life old things that most people considered trash and had thrown away.

    After graduating high school, they both went to college and got 9-to-5 jobs. But just as they were searching through the trash for treasurers in middle school, the duo was drawn back to the trash and to each other.

    Fritz and Wolfe played a dynamic duo that filled the History Channel's catalog with a show that focused on how the duo scours back streets and small town main streets in search of stories and “tips.”

    More: Frank Fritz, co-star alongside Mike Wolfe on the popular TV show “American Pickers,” has died at the age of 60

    Fritz is taking a break after 10 years

    Ten years after the show premiered in 2020, Fritz said goodbye, creating a wedge between the dynamic duo. In 2022, his health deteriorated greatly when he suffered a stroke and lay lifeless on the floor of his Davenport home.

    Fritz's recovery was quite rocky in the months following his stroke, resulting in hospitalizations for seizures, high blood pressure and pneumonia symptoms, according to 911 tapes.

    But in June 2023, the duo finally got back together – Wolfe and Fritz met for the first time in three years.

    A “longtime friend” of Fritz told Barb Ickes of the Quad-City Times that the couple reminisced about “old times,” including hers, before an appearance on “The Late Show With David Letterman,” one of the couple's early talk shows common nervousness phenomena.

    Wolfe “said, 'No one can replace you, Frank,'” the friend told the Times. “He said it was Frank's 'uniquely fun personality' that made them fit so well together as a team.”

    More: Rob Wolfe from “American Pickers” brings 400 to 500 old cars to the Bettendorf riverbank

    A History Channel tribute to Frank Fritz

    Fritz never returned to Amercian Pickers before his death. However, the first episode of the final season aired just over a week after Fritz's death. This is the 26th season of the series.

    “The timing of this and Frank's death is not ideal, but we have been doing shows without Frank for four years and always wanted him to come back to this crew, but due to health reasons he couldn't,” Wolfe said in an Instagram post on day before the season airs.

    Wolfe made it a point to visit Frank in Iowa, bringing the History Channel team with him each time.

    “Every time the crew and I were in Iowa, we sat by Frank's side and let him know how much he was missed, that he could never be replaced, and we will work incredibly hard on every episode to make him proud to do.” Wolfe said in the post. “As always, since Frank left, I dedicate this show and all the others this season in his honor.”

    More: How Mike Wolfe and Frank Fritz overcame fame and public divisions to create a “picker” empire

    Motorcycle ride and concert in honor of Fritz this spring

    According to Facebook posts from close friends and numerous interviews in The Sun, a tabloid that covered the “American Pickers” star's life after his exit from the show, there will be a memorial motorcycle ride and a spring in Fritz's honor give a concert.

    Fritz wanted his ashes placed on the back of a motorcycle or in a sidecar for a ride around the Quad Cities, Fritz's close friend Jerry Gendreau told the Sun in October.

    Fritz had an affinity for motorcycles and was often looking for old chopper paraphernalia such as gas station signs or oil cans. He traveled to Sturgis, South Dakota, considered the largest motorcycle event in the world, and hit the road with Robbie Wolfe, Mike's brother, who replaced Fritz on the History Channel show.

    Further details about the memorial will be announced once the details are finalized.

    Kyle Werner is a reporter for the Register. Reach him at [email protected].

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    Kathleen William
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