Графични страници
PDF файл
ePub
[graphic][merged small]

THE POPULARITY OF WINTER SPORTS HAS ROLLED UP LIKE A BIG SNOWBALL

THE CARNIVAL SEASON IN NEW HAMPSHIRE

D

What Winter Sports Have Done For the State

ARTMOUTH entertained one thousand guests at her thirteenth annual Carnival this year. Laconia estimates that over five thousand people participated in her winter sports the week end of February 10. When Manchester held her celebration, the schools of the city and many of the business houses declared a halfholiday.

These few facts about the carnival season just closing are taken at random from the newspapers of the past few weeks, but they serve to show how firm a grip the carnival idea has upon New Hampshire. And the idea is the development of the last dozen. years. How did it come about? New Hampshire winters have not changed. There have always been the same drifts of crisp white snow, the same clear blue skies, the same brisk, bracing air. But the entire attitude of people toward winter has

undergone a transformation nothing short of miraculous. The popularity of winter sports and carnivals has rolled up like a big snowball, and it is still increasing. How did it start?

Some dozen years ago a boy entering Dartmouth brought with him a pair of home-made skis and a boundless enthusiasm for skiing. Possibly he, more than any other one person, is responsible for the movement, for as founder of the Dartmouth Winter Sports Club, he originated the Carnival at Dartmouth, the forerunner of all the carnivals throughout the state. Much credit is due him. His achievement may be taken as one more instance of what a man with an enthusiasm can accomplish. But he didn't do it singlehanded. It takes the dry tinder of popular receptivity as well as the spark of genius to kindle such a fire. The conditions were right, Dartmouth started the ball

[graphic]

MANCHESTER MINGLED SUMMER AND WINTER SPORTS IN HER SPECTACULAR DIVING
FROM A FORTY-FOOT LEDGE

rolling, and the country as a whole
responded with a vigor which was as
surprising as it was enthusiastic.

Each year more towns and cities fall into line. Each year new features

[blocks in formation]

people venture to take part in the sports. The season just past has been the most successful yet. To list the New Hampshire carnivals would be next to impossible. There are some which are now well established annual events like those at Dartmouth, and Laconia and Newport. There were city carnivals, like that at Manchester, and carnivals in the smaller villages. Tamworth, North Conway, Jackson, Concord, Claremont, Bristol, Tilton, Jaffrey, Gorham-merely listing the names of some of them is enough to give an impression of the variety of the events. And it is safe to say that not one carnival committee completed its work without storing up a grist of ideas for making next year's celebration bigger and better than this year's. The carnival enthusiasm has by no means reached its peak yet.

In some respects carnivals are as alike as peas. The parade which starts proceedings, the ski-jumping,

[graphic]
[graphic][ocr errors][subsumed][merged small]

THE NEW ENGLAND SKATING ASSOCIATION MADE LACONIA THE SCENE OF ITS EXHIBITIONS the tug of war, the races on snowshoes, the coasting and tobogganing, the carnival ball-these with modifications appear wherever carnivals are given. They are always popular, always productive of fun and good fellowship.

With this fundamental similarity, however, goes an originality which makes each carnival distinctive, quite apart from any other event. Sometimes these distinctive features have little or no direct connection with winter sports in themselves-like Manchester's carnival movies or Dartmouth's loud-speaking radio which supplied music for the skaters. Sometimes they consist of unusual exhibitions by professionals or semi-professionals. At North Conway one interesting feature was the ski-jumping by a father of sixty and his son aged eleven, the oldest and the youngest ski-jumpers in the country. The New England Skating Association made Laconia the scene of skating exhibitions unequalled in the whole state. At Gorham the presence of a fine team of Eskimo dogs helped to make the carnival a success. And Manchester found itself featured in every roto

a

gravure section in New England by the daring mingling of summer and winter sports by the boys who again and again made a forty-foot dive from snow-covered ledge into water which could be kept from freezing over only by constant work on the part of men stationed at the foot of the ledge for that purpose. Most interesting of all, however, were the special features which developed out of the individual character of the townBristol's ox parade, Newport's deer

[graphic][merged small][merged small][merged small]
[graphic][graphic][merged small][merged small][merged small][graphic]
[graphic][subsumed][subsumed][subsumed][subsumed]
« ПредишнаНапред »