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107 Years of Fun: Looking Back at the Newport Winter Carnival’s History

By Dylan Marsh
EAGLE TIMES STAFF
NEWPORT — Excitement is high as the town of Newport prepares for its annual Winter Carnival celebration.

This year will mark the 107th anniversary of the nearly week-long event, and town members have reason to believe that it is the oldest consecutively running winter carnival in the United States.

“We believe that we have the oldest continuously running winter carnival in the country,” stated Newport Historical Society president Larry Cote. “The concept started in Canada in the 1890s. Then St Paul, Minnesota had the first in the country and they did theirs for one or two years and stopped. Then they started again around the same time we did ours, but had to stop during the second World War. Dartmouth started around the same time we did, but they stopped for the war too.”

The idea of having a winter carnival was first thought up in 1916 as a way to bring tourism and life to the cold winters of New Hampshire. William Rand, host of the then Newport House and Robert E. Gould, the New England Commissioner of Hotels and Railroads, sought a way to have families from Boston take “snow trains” to the area. Gould, who has been credited as the “Father of Newport’s Winter Carnival”, has been noted as an incredibly large part of the success of the carnival through his ideas of events.

In the early days of the carnival, the events were geared toward winter sports, such as skiing, snowshoeing, ski-joring and toboggan chutes. Skiing in particular wasn’t nearly as widespread as it is now, with the first ski resort opening only the year before in 1915. A large Finnish population in Newport brought the sport to the small town and it flourished.

Regardless of the weather each year people would flock to the small town of Newport for its winter carnival. Even when the year lacked snow, events were planned to accommodate the large number of visitors. In 1922, a year that was stated as “lacking snow” saw crowds head for Georges Mills for ice fishing, an illuminated ice carnival on the common featuring a firework display, acrobating skating with roughly 600 ice skaters and for a dollar a couple plus war tax people could go “fancy dancing”.

While the Winter Carnival had many successful years, some years were straining on the community particularly during World War Two. It was reported that in 1944 the Carnival was largely streamlined due to the lack of help and transportation issues. While most of the traditional winter sports were held as usual, some events were not able to go on such as a woodchopping contest, due to the log and one of the contestants not showing up to the event.

In 1946, Gould arranged for the incredibly popular radio program Vox Pop to broadcast from Newport. Roughly 1,200 tickets were given out to attend the broadcast. An overflow of attendees caused police and firemen to close the hall and send people to the Grange Hall. Cash prizes were given away to, “those willing to risk their dignity on stage.”

In more recent times, the Newport Winter Carnival even managed to secure a Guiness World Record. According to the Union Leader, the 2011 edition of the event featured the world’s largest Mustache and Beard Competition. In total, 462 carnival-goers presented their fantastic facial hair.

The events of the longest consecutively running winter carnival have changed with the times and new ideas, the tradition of bringing the community together remains.

“I just think it’s so impressive and it brings so much joy to the town. It is always such an exciting time,” said Richards Free Library employee Janice Brehio.

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