The community is inviting to see the amazing art and craftsmanship that is going into the restoration of the classic 36-pony carousel at a special Winter Carnival event next weekend. 

“Celebrate Romance with the Ponies” will be held Saturday, Feb. 15, at “The Stable,” 502 Church St., the new centralized home for the carousel. An open house will be held from 11 a.m.-5 p.m., with a special concert held from 2-5 p.m. There is no charge to attend, but donations will be accepted to continue restoration of the carousel and toward the purchase and renovation of the facility. 

The original Allan Herschell carousel from circa 1920, was carved in the “country fair style” for which Herschell was famous. The Carousel of Smiles, as it is known, is one of the few intact hand-carved carousels remaining from the 4,000 or so created during the “golden age” of carousels in the early 19th century. 

At the event, 24 of the completed ponies will be on display along with many of the other colorful pieces that make up a carousel. In addition to the ponies, The Old Time Fiddlers will be performing in a special concert at the event. 

With plenty of swagger, and an assortment of instruments from banjos and guitars to fiddles and cello, the Old Time Fiddlers are a diverse group of can-do musicians “who laugh a lot, play a lot, and in general, they start and stop together on time, in time, and in the right key,” said Clay Hutchison, co-founder of The Carousel of Smiles along with his wife, Reno. 

The Old Time Fiddlers got their start in 2022 when Les Tucker, a Western swing hall of fame fiddler, gathered a group of like-minded local musicians. The goal, group members said, was to have fun playing music, performing, inspiring and, in general, to “have more fun than grown-ups should be allowed to have.” The group is known for its foot-stomping, hand-clapping music from their repertoire of Irish, Scottish, Western swing and old-time tunes, as well as sweet waltzes.   

The Feb. 15 event is the latest chance for the community to visit with the ponies and get an up-close look at the carousel’s careful restoration, now estimated at about 85% complete. 

The Hutchisons won the nearly intact carousel at a 2000 auction, storing it in the two cargo trailers in which it was found at a New York storage facility before they brought it to Sandpoint in 2017. The couple then formed the nonprofit Carousel of Smiles so that the community could have its own nonprofit. 

The nonprofit leased the former Bizarre Bazaar location on Church Street, now known as “The Stables,” with an option to buy the site. The allows The Carousel of Smiles to focus on the carousel’s future with the goal of transforming the site into a centerpiece destination for the downtown. 

The project, for both the volunteers and the Hutchisons, is a labor of love, a gift to the community they have come to love, and a celebration of the magic that carousels bring, the couple said. 

"Carousels are just magic," Reno Hutchison said at a November fun fair organized to celebrate the community’s nonprofits. "They are just magic, tangible magic."