Erik Nordberg, over at the MTU Archives, supplied us with this shot of snow statues from 1949. According to Erik, they're in front of Hubbell Hall and the Mechanical Shops.

Winter Carnival at Michigan Tech in Houghton, will get into full swing this week. This year's theme is, What we love the most, from Coast to Coast. Busy time, finishing up the statues for the final judging on Thursday, Feb. 5th, with the one-nighters starting up at 4:00 p.m., Wednesday, Feb. 4th. That's always a fun night to take a stroll around campus and watch the finishing touches being put on the sculptures. Good place to get a cup of hot suklaa or hot siideri and maybe a pickled egg too!

	Groundhog Day is not something which can be postulated from a philosopher's armchair. 
	It can be ascertained only by careful and precise field observation.

By the way, we put the wraps on 5 weeks of WOW's in January, with some beautiful U.P. winter scenes by David Antikainen, Donn de Yampert, and Roger Kangas. Click on the name of each of these Pasty Camists to see their personal galleries - - so many great scenes you'll be busy all afternoon. Who needs the Super Bowl!

-5degF here in Gaylord Michigan with over 70 inches of snow in January makes it feel like da UP ! Time for some cross country skiing today !

JK

Is there a link to where we can see the progress of this year's statues ?

UP_gal

Here's a link to pics and webcams to watch the statue construction live. :)

http://www.mtu.edu/carnival/

tracie, Thanks for the link. Enjoyed the pics.
Oh yes, We are having a Winter carnival of sorts here in Houston. Downtown until midnight last night. Never seen this town so excited about anything before. Pats or Panthers, doesn't seem to matter to the locals here. Party, party, party and party some more...it's Superbowl XXXVIII (38 for the rest of us). Problem remains: there isn't another game on the other channel if this one isn't pretty. Cheers.

Oh ---- the Lions aren't playing in the Super Bowl this year?

Toivo -- Thanks for another great set of WOW's! Now trying to decide which one to use first!

Here's another web cam site for live statue pics

http://www.admin.mtu.edu/urel/cams/statue1/motion.html

Go Patriots! Michigan Alumni Tom Brady & Ty Law.
Has anyone else seen all the commercials on ESPN about the Watersmeet Nimrods? ESPN is running those commercials quite often.

Saw the Nimrod commercial on ESPN last Wed. for the first time and totally laughed my butt off!!

Re: Nimrods

During the Michigan State game last night they had the second installment of the Nimrods commercials. In this one the Nimrods beat Bessemer. Who cares about the Super Bowl commercials - these are a lot bettter!

The bridge was built by the ASCE student chapter. It was formed by making a mound of snow (for the arch) then covering it with tar paper.) After the bridge was constructed, the snow under the arch was removed, leaving the arch of ice. The bridge itself was made of many layers of snow then iced down. The cobble stone on the side were carved in the ice. The bridge lasted well into spring, when the Tech maintainence crew broke it up with jack hammers and hauled it away.

My wife just came in and remined me that we made the ASCE letters with blue ice cubes made in our refridgerator. She also remined me that students would walk over the bride as a short cut. That is why the school removed it in the sping.

I looked up the meaning of Nimrod. It is a biblical name. "A hunter and builder of the kingdom of Babel" I think the commercials are great. From the Ironwood Daily globe Watersmeet is getting swamped with requests for Nimrod sweat shirts. Great! What I don't know is how/why did Watersmeet come up with the name. Anybody know?

Forwarded to me by a (former) friend...

The United States Treasury has announced they are recalling the new Michigan quarters: "we are recalling all of the new Michigan quarters
that were recently issued," Undersecretary Russell Shackelford said in a press
conference Monday. "This comes in the wake of numerous reports to this
agency that the quarters will not work in parking meters, toll booths,
vending machines, pay phones, or other coin-operated devices."

"We believe the problem lies in a design flaw," said Shackelford. The
winning design for the Michigan quarter was submitted by a Yooper. (a person who lives in the Upper Peninsula or UP for you non Michiganders.)
"Apparently, the duct tape holding the two dimes and nickel together keeps jamming in the coin-operated devices

Go Nimrods! Neat commercials! Spent a couple of weeks in that area back in 1955, my oldest daughter was a baby. We fished on Lake Gogebic for walleyes and Lac Vieux Desert(sp?) for muskies. Also fished in the chain of lakes in that area. Seems like there was a big piece of property in there that belonged to the Fisher family? Later on I think I read or heard where the family gave the property to the State of Michigan for a park? There was a dump in that area some place where you could go to in the evenings and see bear.

"Nimrod: A great hunter" -

Pretty appropriate nickname for a team from Watersmeet, it seems to me! Hope the folks at the school are making a nice profit from the t-shirts and sweatshirts to help support the school district! The article that Joe referenced mentioned they are planning to sell DVDs & VHS copies of the commercials too.

P&G - I've got to ask - what ON EARTH is with the Groundhog Day obsession?!?!?

I believe Nimrod was the greatgrandson of Noah, founded a great settlement / city... The city was referenced many times, but famous as the destination for Jonah, who as memory serves me, did some swimming with the fishes...

Nimrods home page http://www.watersmeet.k12.mi.us/nimrod.html

Question: Did they have one-nighters back in 1949 too?

Ground Hog Day is the midway point between winter and spring. The Delaware Indians believed that ground hogs were their ancestors. Early German settlers celebrated a day called Candlemas Day [a tradition brought to America in the early 1700's] which was on Feb. 2. They thought that if the weather was sunny that there would be 6 more weeks of cold and stormy weather and visa versa. German settlers decided to change it to ground hog day rather than Candlemas, maybe to please the Indians? The tradition carries on today. I think this started in Pennsylvania?

Forgot to mention the passing away of Robert (Bob) Tumperi former Lake Linden-Hubbell graduate. Nice guy. At one time lived on 9th st. in Lake Linden. West Point Gratuate also. May he rest in peace.

Was that a pastie at half time on the Super Bowl tonite?

Yes, it was a 'pay-stee' at the Superbowl...no it wasn't a paasty! Yuck!

Nimrods! I'm thinking "Watersmeet"...
a place where the "waters meet"? Logical?

As for the dump near Lake Gogebic...yep, it was quite the tourist attraction, or an evenings entertainment...depending on how you looked at it. We lived at Lake Gogebic one summer (my husband was a Ranger in the area then); and we spent many evenings watching bears at the dump. However, we'd leave pretty darn quick when there were tourists pushing little "Betsy" out of the car to pat a bear cub on the head in an attempt to get a good photo with one! YIKES what were they thinking!

Good story Dave.
When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.

The Germans originally used badgers in Europe, but there weren't any in PA. Feb 2 is the date in the US as that is when groundhogs start stirring that far north--it would have been a lot later had the Germans settled in the UP!

Saw the ads several times on Saturday. Curious to get a couple of "Nimrod" baseball caps. How?