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| (2008) The "snowwoman" towering over this village features eyelashes created from discarded skis and bright red lips made from painted car tires. She wears a giant red hat and a 100-foot-long scarf, and her blond tresses are made from rope. She gets a little bling from a snowflake pendant that's 6 feet long. | "She's a beauty. Gotta love those eyelashes," said Robin Zinchuk, executive director of the local chamber of commerce and a chief instigator of the town's offbeat project. |
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| With the temperature in single digits, several hundred people including busloads of schoolchildren turned out for Friday's dedication of the 122-foot-tall mountain of snow. | This ski town of about 2,400 residents already holds the record for tallest snowman, dedicated in 1999. Since then, they have been waiting for someone else to break the record. When no one rose to the challenge, the folks here decided they'd have to break the record themselves. |
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| Mark Bancroft, who donated the 150-foot crane used during the project, noted that it has been a tough winter with high fuel costs and nasty weather. | "What does Bethel, Maine, do when it gets tough? We build a snowman!" he said to the muffled applause of mittens and gloves clapping together. |
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| "Olympia," named for Maine's senior senator, Olympia Snowe, stands nearly 10 feet taller than "Angus, King of the Mountain," who was dedicated by the town in 1999. That snowman, named for then-Gov. Angus King, was created by the same folks responsible for Olympia. | Last year's (2007) Angus King. |
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| Although the snowwoman's namesake was unable to attend Friday's dedication because of her duties in Washington, a statement was read to the crowd. | "I've joked that it's just my luck I'd have a world record-breaking monument named after me -- and it will be gone by summer," the senator said. |
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