Bob Gilreath has put together a slideshow of MTU's Winter Carnival Snow Statues for us. Artistry in the Arctic - - Houghton, MI, is pretty far north, but not quite Arctic enough to be inhabited by penguins. Lions, perhaps, bears for sure, but penguins? Can't say that I've ever seen one of those tuxedoed fellas around these parts!

Thanks to the MTU-Webcams, I have been able to watch the work in progress on two of the displays. Hope we see more stills as the Ice Festival begins.

Is it my imagination, or have the snow statues gotten better over the years? I remember going to see the snow statues back in the late 50's and early 60's with my parents, and yes they were excellent then but they seem to have gotten even better with more attention to detail. Maybe it's an art that gets passed down and just keeps getting improved.

Bob Great shots. Thanks for the picture my son a member of TKE up there. Have been showing their progress on the web cam during their building. But could not get the detailed shots you took. Thank you for taking the pictures.

Excellent picture. Right now, I'm in Kirkuk, Iraq, and I tell ya, seeing snow and ice and good stuff like that sure hits the spot. I'm here with the Air Force - I've been here since November, and next month I get to go back to my home station - in San Antonio, Texas. I don't get to see too much snow unless I go home, which doesn't happen that often, so I have to rely on great pictures such as this to keep memories of home alive. Thanks!

Wah!!! More Yoopers serving our great country. I like that. I do remember going up to Houghton to see the sculptures back in 96. Absolutely stunning. Wish we had enough snow in Iron County to do that. Have a great day everyone!!!

The sculptures have gotten better. I participated during the late 60's and these are about three steps above. Wish I was there to see them in person, but the cams help. Off to Key West later today for a week, so it will be another world compared to "da Tech." It's cold down there today........mid 70's..........YEH

See this site for Winter Carnival 2004 Night Photographs http://pasty.com/pcam/albuo06 .

Regards,
Donn de Yampert
www.deyampert.com see photographs

Donn- You are amazing... did you have help holding/arranging lights for those night statue shots, or just your flash? Or is it just long exposure time? I never figured out how to capture the detail of the statues in the normally flat daylight... I guess I should have tried more night shots.

Beautiful pictures Bob and Donn. Thanks for sharing!

What is the theme for this years carnival? When I was at Tech in 1961, as a member of the Independents (local students), we built a statue in front of the old administration building. The theme for the carnival was "100 Years of Progress" so we built a large drop forge and men with an anvil and hammer. We went to Dollar Bay and cut ice blocks out in the bay and hauled them back to build the drop forge. Let me tell you, that was cold work and we did it at night. We did win 1st place that year.

Those cages with the hill behind them reminds me of the zoo in Marquette out on Presque Isle point. I'm sorry to see the old zoo gone, but I guess that's progress!

Dennis Kemper has another nice slideshow in his gallery, of snow statue pics. Almost like being there, only no chill!

Flew a small plane into Houghton on last 4th of July. While picking up the rental car, I saw a very bewildered young couple standing in front of the ticket agent. Seems they thought they were going to Hancock New York and found themselves in Hancock, MI. No problem said the ticket agent who took them to his home for the night until they could get a flight out next day. My question....If you Yoopers keep being so nice to people like this, they will want to come back. This lucky couple discovered our secret part of the country and the type of people who live there.
Have a great Winter Carnival..............

Everyone, please forgive my naivete, but when the carnival is over, do they just let the statues melt naturally or are they destroyed? Inquiring minds want to know!! Wish I could be in the U.P. now to try out a few X Country trails.

My first, and last, experience at building snow sculptures was not so grand. I was attending LSSC in the Soo. We had a Winter Festival of sorts; but it never had the tradition of large scale sculptures as that of our larger sister college, Michigan Tech. I attended in the late 60's/ early 70's and one of the themes to our Winter Festival was "Let Freedom Ring" or something like that.

Our dorm, Brady Hall, decided to build a "one-nighter" Liberty Bell. We had a nice turnout and work progressed well into the night. One team formed up a giant 10 foot bell while the other team formed up a giant yardarm to place across the top of the bell. It was late that night when we were finally ready to haul the yardarm atop the bell. We hadn't realized how slippery that smooth ice surface of the bell was going to be OR how heavy the yardarm was.

After several failures, a decision was made to chisel steps up the side of the bell to make it easier to carry the yardarm up the hard ice slope. We figured that we could fill the steps in after we hauled up the yardarm.

That accomplished, we proceeded to again attempt to haul the slippery, heavy crossbar up to the top of the bell. Unfortunately, after many more tries, it finally slipped out of our grasp and fell smashing to pieces at the bottom of the bell.

It was so late, and so cold that most of the crew said they'd had it and headed to their warm rooms
for the night.

Only two of us remained; looking dejectedly at all our hard work... a smashed yardarm, and a firm mound of snow. Immediately the same "vision" of how to redeem our efforts and create "something" of our sculpture came to mind.

We re-carved a protruberance into the top of the "bell" and painted it red. Smiling and satisfied with our work; we headed for bed. Early the next morning, we got a irritated phone call from the Dean... "our snow busom" would have to go!

So, goes my Snow Sculpture experience!

They wait a little while and then take a front end loader to them. How long they wait depends on how cold it is. My freshman year it was so warm they knocked them down the Monday or Tueday after carnival. They don't want them falling on people or in inconvient places. Last year they lasted quite a while though.

Great slide show Bob.

Dear Yooper Troops,

Thank you for serving our country. I hope you know how appreciated you are, especially in this dangerous "post-war" period. Bless you and come home soon to warm pasties and cold snow.

to the yooper troopers fantastic job keep up the good work always i remain walter p

I hear snow was deliverd along with Stillwaters Pasties to Brentwood Tn. They are having a real U.P. dinner this evening.

Seeing all that snow on the frat house above reminded me of the Mad Roofsledder, who has appeared on these pages from time to time. A glimpse of this guy rates right up there with Bigfoot or the Loc Ness monster. Here are a couple of shots slipped to us today by the local papparazzi, a recent Roofsledder sighting:

ha ha those are funny who when and were was that
LOOKs like fun ha ha

Ah yes, it brings back lots of marvelous memories....snow statues, Winter Carnival and watching older siblings and cousins getting ready for the Snowball and thinking it was so cool, roof sledding, jumping from the roof into the snow banks, ice rinks in your neighbors' back yards, eating icicles, going down the hills of Houghton on anything that could slide (cardboard boxes worked great), ice skating at Dee Stadium and the outdoor rink by Houghton High School, snow days, and so many more great things.

On another note, my heartfelt thanks to all of you serving our Country throughout the world. Your sacrifice on our behalf is truly courageous and noble. Thank you for helping to keep freedom alive. The love and prayers of many of us go out to you each and every day.

Yooper in Iraq, and Mike, and all other soldiers that are able to read this. Thanks for standing proud fighting a righteous battle on command for those of us you have never even met. I would never have had the courage to make such a brave decision to become a member of any U.S. armed forces. Thanks for doing it for me!!!!

Stefan,

It was I, the wild roof sledder. I was sledding off a barn in Lake Linden. There are more shots of roof sledding as well as clearing off a roof...boy was that fun! There will be more roof sleding pics at the end of the week as I'll be going down that one roof too.

www.pasty.com/pcam/grizzlyadams

Enjoy!

nice pic

Winter Carnival was great!! It brought in a lot of money to the area. To bad Tech Lost 4-1 the first night but the second they improved and worked hard and lost only 3-1. Connor scored!!! The huskies got a good record. 4-13. Go Tech!!!!