Though it may be hard to believe now, in the late 1800s, Lake Tahoe barely had any tourists. And that was especially true in the winter, in the days long before ski resorts, casinos and luxury hotels. 

That’s why, in 1894, one enterprising Truckee resident came up with a lofty idea to bring tourists to town by creating inexpensive winter recreation near the train station. He spearheaded the construction of a 50-foot-tall ice palace, one so wide that it blocked the town’s main intersection. The ice palace even had a public luge track, dropping guests down all 50 feet to the street below. 

Over the next few years, the ice palace was rebuilt and expanded as part of the newly branded “Truckee Winter Carnival,” which included an ice skating rink, sleigh rides, ski exhibitions and competitions, and discounted rates on the Transcontinental Railroad, which connected San Francisco to Truckee in 1868. Just $9.30 bought a round-trip ride in an “oil burning locomotive” with “no annoying smoke.” 

More than 100 years later, local organizers are hoping to bring the carnival back in a major way, with three days of events planned for Feb. 2 through 4. But there could be one problem: While Truckee’s Winter Carnival is back, Truckee’s once-reliable winter snow definitely is not. 

Truckee is synonymous with California skiing, but the area’s first ski resort didn’t open until 1939, when Sugar Bowl opened the state’s first lift chair on Mount Disney. Before that, tourism in Tahoe was only in summer, and limited to a small collection of wealthy families in San Francisco who could afford to spend entire summers at resorts like Glen Alpine Springs and the Tallac Resort. 

But in 1894, politician C.F. McGlashen built an enormous ice palace and spread word about the Truckee Winter Carnival, designed to sell railroad tickets and fill hotels mid-winter. It quickly became an event “loaded to a fare-ye-well with visitors.” After a few years, the town expanded its toboggan and sled rides outside of downtown Truckee to the area now occupied by Cottonwood Restaurant, then called “Snow Peak.” Festival organizers built a permanent bridge over the Truckee River to accommodate visitors during the events, expanding the town beyond the rail station. 

Papers said the carnival “promised to eclipse any ever held in America, outside of Canada” by 1910. In preparation for the much-ballyhooed event, organizers built a steam-powered toboggan lift, with a runout nearly 1,000 feet long at Snow Peak. This lift is generally believed to be the first mechanical lift in the western U.S., and sat aside an ice skating rink and multi-story ski jump. 

Over the next decades, the Truckee Winter Carnival continued in some fashion, drawing “thousands” of visitors who arrived in droves on the railroad for $1 sleigh rides and 50 cent ski rentals. At best, the journey took 10 hours, though it was often delayed for days at a time due to avalanches, and later, fires in the wooden sheds built to protect the tracks from avalanches. 

In 1919, newspapers said there were 1,500 visitors from San Francisco for the carnival, plus 150 visitors from Reno, when Truckee’s population was only 1,718 people. Adjusted for today’s population, that would be like having an extra 16,000 people packed into a few blocks of Truckee’s small downtown core.

The carnival survived through World War I, the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918, the Wall Street crash of 1929, and every other nationwide downtown until the 1930s. 

It wasn’t for a lack of tourists that it ended. The carnival continued until 1938, says Truckee-Donner Historical Society Vice President Chaun Mortier, ending only because the carnival couldn’t find a sponsor after the Truckee Chamber of Commerce declined to continue.

“You have to remember that the early carnivals were to get Truckee on the map as a winter wonderland and get people to Truckee during the winter,” says Judy DePuy, board member for the Museum of Truckee History and volunteer for the Truckee-Donner Historical and Truckee Donner Railroad societies. The combination of the lack of sponsorship and newly budding winter sports businesses — combined with easier travel to Truckee on the paved and automobile-friendly Highway 40 — meant the town didn’t need to manufacture reasons for visitors to cross the Sierra in the winter. 

The carnival was on an extended hiatus by 1940, though that’s not to say it was forgotten. Over the following 70 years, several organizations tried to bring the carnival back, with significant efforts to rebuild an ice palace around the 1960 Winter Olympics. There was a small version of the carnival as recently as 2006. 

It’s been almost two decades since the festival happened, and organizers chose 2024 as the year to bring it back. It’s happening in Truckee from Feb. 2 to 4, and while it’ll be smaller than years past, there are three full days of activities.

“It took a year of planning and getting the right groups engaged,” DePuy says. “And I find that visitors who stop by our museums are always asking for fun things to do. We won’t have the Snowball Express’ trains since people can get here by car, but we are getting the word out.”

The Truckee-Donner Historical Society partnered with the Truckee-Donner Recreation and Park District to reimagine the festival for 2024. In some ways, it should be similar to the past celebrations, with free ice skating, snow play and sledding, dog mushing, and community events all on the agenda since the late 1800s. But the historical society says it’s not about mimicking the festival of years past, but about sharing its history. 

“Those of us in town who are historians are always wanting people to learn about our history and what made this town survive,” says Mortier, “so I would say our goal isn’t to improve on the past, but to share it.” 

This year’s festival has a long list of free, winter-focused events and activities. But so far, this winter’s snowfall total is far below the average, with warm temperatures and heavier-than-average rain. The organizers have already “postponed” some of the events, including the professional and amateur snow sculpture contest, though professional ice sculptors were set to attend. 

Also on the fence are the dog-sledding displays. In early festivals, they were one of the major draws, and the 1915 Truckee Winter Carnival hosted the country’s first official sled dog race. It was such a well-known affair that “Call of the Wild” author Jack London attended, and later stayed for the rest of the Winter Carnival festivities. Dog mushing races and displays continued to be one of the carnival’s most popular activities through the 1930s. 

As of now, 2024’s sled dog demonstrations haven’t been canceled, but volunteer organizer Dave DePuy says they require a base of at least 8 inches of snow, which the park doesn’t currently have. The nearby Truckee Rodeo field has a light layer, but organizers are hoping the next storm headed to the Sierra on Thursday drops enough snow to host what is traditionally the carnival’s most popular event. 

The Truckee Winter Carnival has been completely canceled in years past for lack of snow; in 1920, it was thanks to a simple “lack of snow and ice.” But the changing weather patterns around the Sierra, due to climate change in the past 100 years, may mean that last-minute shifts and unreliable snowfall could become normal if the carnival continues into future years. 

Though there’s not a study specific to Truckee, lead scientist and manager at the UC Berkeley Central Sierra Snow Lab Andrew Schwartz says the lab’s long-term data collected on nearby Donner Summit doesn’t predict a future, consistent snowpack.

“We’ve seen an increase in temperatures every month,” he said via email, “especially in the late and early season months of October, November, M, and may. We’re also seeing more winter rain as a result of those increased temperatures and warming of atmospheric rivers.” Warm temperatures combined with rain deplete the snowpack quicker than temperatures alone, as the rain rapidly melts the existing base. 

Between 1879 and 1909, the snow lab’s 30-year snowfall data from Donner Summit shows an average annual snowfall of 1,134 centimeters, or about 446 inches. But from 1989 to 2019, the total had dropped to 962 centimeters, or 378 inches per year on average. That data mirrors other research findings, including a 30-year study published in 2018 that suggested Sierra Nevada lakes are warming at an unprecedented rate due to climate change. The average annual snowpack across the Western U.S. has declined by more than 20% since 1955, according to EPA data published in 2020, with some measurement locations around Lake Tahoe showing declines of up to 80%. 

“Variability in precipitation, including snowfall, between winters is increasing as we get wetter wet years and drier dry years,” says Schwatrz. He calls the effect of this “hydroclimate whiplash.” “Extremes at either end of the precipitation spectrum are becoming more common, and are making predicting winter weather and water supplies more difficult,” he added. 

This year’s organizers are hoping the festival can still happen as planned, even with the unpredictable winter weather, especially as some of the elements that require extremely cold weather were never considered for 2024’s celebration. Today, the 50-foot-tall slide that sent guests flying down the frozen ice palace would never pass safety standards, nor would a public toboggan slide with a 60% grade.

“What was OK then safety-wise is not today,” Mortier says. “So we had to work out events and things that would bring back the concept of ‘just plain fun to do.’” The 2024 Truckee Winter Carnival was also restrained by budget, says Dave DePuy, also a volunteer and board member of the Museum of Truckee History. In 1913, the cost of the ice palace alone was $10,000, or just over $300,000 when adjusted for inflation. 

“In contrast, we have been very frugal for this year’s event,” he says. “I believe that the total budget for this year’s fun will be significantly less than $400.” 

One thing that will be the same as the very first carnivals is the low cost of participating in most of the festival activities. “We wanted to keep it free this year,” adds Dave DePuy. During the carnivals of the 1930s, even when the Hilltop winter sports area included a steam-powered toboggan lift, ice skating, sledding and skiing, most activities were free or had a nominal cost (though the train company and local Truckee hotels profited considerably from the events). 

This year’s carnival begins Friday, Feb. 2. With storms in the forecast, there’s a good chance of enough fresh snow for activities like dog mushing, snowball target throwing and snowshoe races to go on as planned. Even if the predicted precipitation does reach Truckee’s 5,800-foot elevation as rain rather than snow, many of the carnival events aren’t snow-dependent, including a town-wide “old timey” photo on Friday, free historical lectures and walking tours on Saturday, and winter games like ski “javelin” throwing.

This year’s attendees should cross their fingers that the coming storm makes Truckee look how it did during the carnival of 1895. “There is snow everywhere. The mountains are white with it, the valleys are full of it, and the trees bear heavy burdens of it amid their branches,” said an extended article in The Traveller Magazine. “In the drifts it is ten and twelve feet deep, but on the level, hardly more than three or four.”

While that may seem like quite a bit of snow, the article goes on to show just how much Truckee’s weather has changed. “As of yet,” the author wrote, “it is a mild winter.”