Two Pixel the Snowman snow globes will be going home with two Estes Valley Voice readers, Marty Miranda and Becka Gatchel, and for the record, Miranda’s favorite snowman is Frosty, and Gatchel’s favorite is Olaf.
Thank you to the 125 people who entered our second annual drawing and shared their answers to our simple survey questions: who is your favorite snowman and why, and do you have any favorite memories about snowmen?
Hands down, Frosty the Snowman is the proverbial favorite snowman. We provided a list of 14 famous snowmen, including Frosty and Olaf from the Disney movie “Frozen,” as well as the Abominable Snowman from Monsters, Inc., and Everest, a baby Yeti from the film Abominable. We also included some really obscure choices in the hopes of triggering memories.
Frosty was the fan favorite with 56% of the vote, followed by Olaf, then the Abominable Snowman, then Sam from the 1964 Rankin/Bass TV Special Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Everest, the baby Yeti in the film Abominable, pulled in 3% of the vote.
We asked readers to tell us why they voted for a specific snowman, and by far the most popular two reasons were that their snowman was friendly and magical. For many readers, snowmen evoke memories of their childhood, or of watching one of the snowman-themed television shows or movies with their children or grandchildren.
Carol Dreselly’s favorite snowman is Everest from the film Abominable. Years ago, when her twin sons, Nick and Mike, did a gap year, they launched Snowman Productions, a videography company that videotaped high school graduations in Front Range towns and sessions at the Colorado State Capitol. Dreselly told the Estes Valley Voice that her sons were born close to Christmas and “love all things Christmasy.”
Bank of Estes Park’s president and CEO, Scott Applegate, said Frosty the Snowman is his all-time favorite. “It reminds me of my own childhood, and of my daughters, watching the video over and over,” said Applegate.
Barb Prentiss, who many in Estes know as Mrs. Santa, picked Frosty and says she has fond memories of “singing Frosty’s song in my younger years.” The song “Frosty the Snowman” dates back to 1950 and was first recorded by Gene Autry and the Cass County Boys, followed by Jimmy Durante, before becoming a made-for-TV special in 1969.
Deb Callahan picked Olaf as her favorite snowman and said she liked how “he could fall apart and magically pull himself back together again.”
Stacey Cole-Winsor also said Olaf was her favorite. The mom of three collects snowmen in groups of three and groups of five to represent her childhood family.
Two educators chose Sam the Snowman from the 1964 TV show about Rudolph. Nancy Kixmiller, a retired middle school instrumental and vocal music teacher from Missouri who now makes her home in Estes, said Sam was her favorite because he was “folksy,” and April Snively, a math tutor at Wyzant, the nation’s largest online network of tutors, also chose Sam and reminisced about “just being curled up in holiday blankets as a kid with my sister while watching Sam take us through Rudolph’s story.”
Alexander Switzer picked the Abominable Snowman from Monsters, Inc. and said he liked how the snowman was villainous. Switzer’s husband had family who visited Estes Park from Puerto Rico this year and saw snow for the first time.
“In Estes, his sisters (whom I had just met), he, and I made our first snowman together. It had qualities and names to it that I can’t remember. But I do remember the smiling, laughing, snowball fights and silly questions in the process of building their first ever snowman,” Switzer said.
Teresa Mueller, who has lived in Guatemala and Texas, shared that she had not seen snow until she was 30 and could not imagine how cold it could be. Mueller also picked Frosty as her favorite.
One Estes reader, Susan King, shared that the snowman in the book “Stranger in the Woods” by Carl R. Sams and Jean Stoick was her favorite pick. That book and the snowman reference had slipped our list, but we will add it to our choices next year.
The stories our readers shared were heartwarming, but not snow-melting. We wouldn’t want to put Pixel in harm’s way. And while everyone has a favorite snowman, Pixel the snowman, who lives in a magical snow globe, is our favorite.
What makes the snow globe magical? Shake it on a warm summer day and watch it snow.
How did Pixel get his name? The Estes Valley Voice is published digitally in pixels, not on paper that can end up in a landfill if not properly recycled. Pixel is all about sustainability, and as a snowman, he is concerned about global climate change.
“The History of the Snowman”
Dreselly also reached out to the EVV and offered to share her copy of “The History of the Snowman” by author and illustrator Bob Eckstein.
Filled with photos and drawings, the 177-page book is an excellent read on a cold winter’s night, tracing the history of the anthropomorphic snow sculpture from the Dark Ages to modern times, pop culture, Hollywood and Madison Avenue, and its appearances around the world and across cultures in fine art and cartoons, politics, as an advertising pitchman, and as an icon of winter.
Not all representations of snowmen are charming or playful, and some are dark and deeply disturbing. Eckstein’s research found that the earliest visual representation of a snowman is an anti-Semitic depiction of one wearing a yarmulke and being melted over a fire in an illustrated Book of Hours, a medieval Christian devotional. The manuscript, located in the library of the Koninklijke Bibliotheek in The Hague, dates back to 1380.
For those who love cultural history, the book is a treasure trove of information.
Thank you to all our readers who shared their favorite snowman, and thank you to all our readers for their kind and generous support of the Estes Valley Voice.
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