What a great local tradition

I've got friends in the north near Kirkland Lake, Ontario and they do a similar annual fundraiser with a Volkswagon Beetle - they've been doing it for years with the same car. I think it's for fundraising for their local fire department.

Kenogami & District Volunteer Fire Brigade - Herbie Car Fundraiser

The car is cleaned up and cleared for environmental pollutants and then fished out every spring and repeated again the next winter. I always thought it was funny seeing that old yellow car on the ice.

You going to Thawing Man this year?

Plot device in a Neil Gamen book IIRC Edit: the book was American Gods and it's Gaiman. Interesting read...

My parents lived in a small town called Yellowknife in Canada many years ago, before there was a highway there. Float planes would land on Great Slave Lake until it froze over, then skid planes. In the spring when the ice got thin, there was a pool collected by the first pilot who landed a float plane. They would come in and gently skim the ice to break it up before settling onto the water. Just occurred to me as I typed this, I never asked what happened if somebody tried it too soon and the ice wouldn't break. Unfortunately it's too late to ask now, my parents are both gone.

Reminds me of this fun local tradition in Nederland, CO:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frozen_Dead_Guy_Days
https://frozendeadguydays.com/

That's neat! We just have a sign on the river, and people guess when the ice will start moving. More precisely, when the sign will pass under the bridge. A dummy would definitely be more fun, but some teenagers would probably steal or break it... or someone would mistake it for someone drowning in the spring as it travels towards the sea. Maybe it's better to just stick to the sign.

Wait... If they give half the proceeds to the historical society, then the people who won are only getting their original money back. There are no winnings.