“I’ve taken over this part of the project which was previously coordinated by Jeff Angeletti, who did an absolutely fantastic job for a number of years,” said conservation teacher Christian Hy. “It’s great to have our students get involved and I’m very happy to continue on this tradition.”

For the first-year teacher, the ice castle project presents a number of hands-on lessons for his students.

“For our class, this project shows us how to properly use natural resources that are available throughout the year. A lot of people don’t realize Chautauqua Lake used to have all of its ice removed and sent off to major cities across the country,” Hy said.

“A couple of other aspects of how this ties into our program is it shows students how to be environmentally friendly, and it ties in with our heavy equipment operation. This project shows what we’re able to do and what the program represents.

Members of the Jamestown High School Class of 2021 are pictured last year at Chautauqua Institution. P-J file photo

There are a number of steps to create the castle, beginning with the carving out of dozens of approximately two-by-four cubes weighing a few hundred pounds each. The blocks are then shuttled through a channel to a loading area where students hook the cubes and pulley them up the boat launch. Finally, the cubes are scooped up with a loader and transported to the construction area for placement.

The finished product can be seen beginning Friday evening with the Lighting of the Castle at 6 p.m. at Lakeside Park. For complete event details, find The Mayville Winter Festival on Facebook.