ST. PAUL, MINN. Ice palace to return to winter festival

The planned walk-through structure will have 75-foot-high walls.
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) -- Towering palaces of ice, those glittering symbols of northern spirit that have enchanted winter festival-goers for generations, have been noticeably absent from the frosty landscape here for more than a decade.
The annual St. Paul Winter Carnival, a popular embrace of all things frozen, hasn't built a palace since 1992, when costs soared, leaving the project with a $600,000 deficit and the festival without its ethereal centerpiece.
But it's been even longer -- 62 years, to be exact -- since awe-struck visitors could not only regard the icebound fortresses, but stroll through their rooms and corridors as well.
This year's planned version, with multiple rooms that visitors can tour inside 75-foot-high walls spanning 240 feet, would be an homage to the grandeur of palaces and festivals past.
Hazel Wallace and Inez French remember those days.
"You kind of had the feeling of being closed in. Most people went in, got a look and left," Wallace recalled. "It's not like they hung pictures on the wall! It was one ice cube on top of another."
As French remembered, "It was so beautiful -- but cold inside."
Literary reference
Favorite son F. Scott Fitzgerald himself, in a 1920 short story, seemed both inspired and terrified by the ice palaces, which are built here and in only a handful of cities around the world.
"It was magnificent, it was tremendous!" one of his characters thinks upon entering one such castle. But later, after getting lost in a dark and chilly maze, she laments: "It was an icy breath of death."
"People call us every year and ask, 'Will there be a palace this year?"' said Robert Viking, the executive director of the St. Paul Festival and Heritage Foundation.
With the help of local businesses, trade unions and architects, there will be. In all, 55,000 hours of volunteer work, about $7 million worth of contributions and more than $1 million in donations from businesses and individuals will go into building the palace.
Organizers were still working to raise an additional $250,000. Visiting the palace in downtown St. Paul also will cost $5; in 1992, it was free.
It will take 27,000 blocks of ice -- each one 500 pounds and roughly the size of a bathtub -- to build the castle.
But for it to be ready for the carnival's Jan. 22 opening, construction must start by Friday. Longer delays could mean a scaled-down palace on the downtown site. So far, the site has been wired for lights, and eight concrete archways and scaffolding have been erected.
1941 festival
Wallace and French, who wore white outfits representing the White Satin Sugar company during the festival of 1941, remembered the carnival as a festive event in prewar Minnesota, when residents devoured the winter around them and showed pride in their city.
"It was a big deal back then," said French, who remains close to Wallace. They were single then, in their 20s and working. They recalled tobogganing, ice fishing contests and bands.
"People were probably not as busy with everything like they are now. All the people we met -- the boys! It was a fun time," French said.
Organizers want the walk-through palace be a big deal again, especially with this year's NHL All-Star Game events of Feb. 7-8 coinciding with the three-week carnival.