The Breakfast Club was a big deal at that time. A write-up when the program was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in New York City, said this: “The Breakfast Club was radio’s first and most successful morning program.”

Don McNeill, toastmaster of the radio show, was carnival king with this description in the program: “A subtle showman each day before his millions of regular listeners and several hundred studio visitors, Don is really a quiet, self-effacing person offstage.”

Fran Allison, carnival queen, was Mr. McNeill’s foil on the show with this unique background as told in the program: “A young school marm from Iowa decided to give up her teaching career and joined the local radio station in Waterloo, Iowa. One day, while awaiting her turn at the mic, the announcer jokingly proclaimed, ‘Well, well, say something, won’t you Aunt Fanny?’ For the rest of the program, Fran ad libbed in the vernacular of a sharp-witted small-town gossip, and the audience responded with persistent pleas for more. Her career in radio was then assured.”

The Breakfast Club broadcast every day for a week from the beautiful 1,200-seat and packed Pontiac Theater. The capacity is absolutely accurate because it came from Kerry Kelly, the big, handsome usher, who later was a crew member on the Navy ship that recovered one of the U.S. space capsules. So, how about that!

(Photo courtesy Saranac Lake Winter Carnival 1957 souvenir program)

Oh yes, back to the carnival. What is missing from this beautiful program is the local touch — no pictures of the high school court, no names of members of the court or in many instances no names under the photos. I guess everyone got carried away with the celebrities.

There are other random listings such as:

“We welcome the following bands to our 1957 Winter Carnival Parade …”

The R.O.T.C. Air Force Band from St. Michael’s College, Winooski, Vermont; Tupper Lake High School; Edwards Central School; Peru Central School; Lake Placid High School; Immaculate Heart Academy, Watertown; Saranac Lake High School Band; and Saranac Lake Boy Scout Drum & Bugle Corps.

Now, in tribute to the great work of the volunteers that build the Ice Palace every year, we print the following poem written by Alfred L. Donaldson, who, I am sure you may not remember, wrote a two-volume comprehensive “History of the Adirondacks” published in 1921.

(Photo courtesy Saranac Lake Winter Carnival 1957 souvenir program)

“Above the purple panels of the night,

We see the whitish outline of pale ice

In phantom dimness; then in clear device

A crystal castle quickens on our sight.

“The phosphorescence of a frozen dream

(Photo courtesy Saranac Lake Winter Carnival 1957 souvenir program)

Lies glowing, captive, in the frosty mould;

Its walls of luscent jasper seem to hold

The sheen of naiads from a mountain stream.

“If God had gathered meteors and stars,

Cased them each in pearl, and bidden them

(Photo courtesy Saranac Lake Winter Carnival 1957 souvenir program)

Reveal to man the New Jerusalem, as

Saints have glimpsed it through their prism bars

“No fairer vision could entrance the eyes

Then this, the Carnival’s apocalypse

Where, for a space, electric lights eclipse

(Photo courtesy Saranac Lake Winter Carnival 1957 souvenir program)

Aurorau wonders of the Northern skies.”

— Alfred L. Donaldson