Remember when, Arkansas? Ice skating at Little Rock River Market cost $4

A skater slides slowly off the ice Dec. 12, 1998, as others enjoy laps around the Little Rock River Market's Miracle at the Market ice skating rink. (Democrat-Gazette file photo)
A skater slides slowly off the ice Dec. 12, 1998, as others enjoy laps around the Little Rock River Market's Miracle at the Market ice skating rink. (Democrat-Gazette file photo)

To collect canned goods for the Arkansas Foodbank Network and give residents a new reason to venture downtown, Southwestern Bell sponsored a temporary ice rink at the fledgling Little Rock River Market for four years beginning in 1997.

This "Miracle at the Market" was a 40- by 70-foot sheet of ice about 1 ½ inches thick in the east pavilion behind the market. The little rink drew 11,000 skaters and an estimated 400,000 spectators in its four-week existence.

The first year, more people wanted to watch the human bumper cars than join them, and yet rink admissions contributed $16,000 of the $18,000 collected by the Mayor's Christmas Tree Fund.

Coinciding with the lighting of the city Christmas tree downtown and a light display and fireworks by the Jennings Osborne family, the mayor's fund collected donations for charities like the American Red Cross, the Arthritis Foundation, Big Brothers/Big Sisters, Volunteers in Public Schools and the Watershed Get Ready Program.

Repeated in December 1998, the rink expanded to 50 by 100 feet, and its $4 admission price combined with temperatures in the 70s to make skating downtown even more popular. Volunteers from the state chapter of the Telephone Pioneers of America and the Red Cross kept the gliding going from noon to 10 p.m. daily. Art students at Booker Arts Magnet School painted colorful backdrops.

The miracle came again in winter 1999 and 2000; but then the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, made such festivities seem inappropriate. Southwestern Bell telephone, wireless and Yellow Pages operations in Arkansas declined to renew their sponsorship. Mayor Jim Dailey dropped the formal tree lighting and the fund drive, too. Only the Osborne lights went on; and a small carousel and miniature train were set up in the pavilion.

During the rink's four years, more than 45,000 skaters took to the ice, contributing more than $125,000 to area charities as well as 3.5 tons of nonperishable food donations.


See a gallery of photos from the ice rink at arkansasonline.com/0124rink.




 Gallery: Miracle at the Market



Upcoming Events