Signs abound Ely is coming out of its annual hibernation

A cursory scan of the internet finds that hibernation is a “state of minimal activity,” with Merriam-Webster defining it as to “pass winter in a torpid or rigid state,” or to “be or become inactive or dormant.”

Of course we’ve all heard the tales of bears hibernating for the winter, but how about an entire community?

Ely is clearly alive for 12 months and 365 days - or 366 in leap years such as this one - annually.

Yet one doesn’t need decades-old roots here to come to the realization that the area, in many respects, hibernates every winter.

The first signs come as September turns to October and then November, with a seemingly growing number of businesses closing for the season and summer residents and cabin owners taking in their docks, batten down the hatches and in many cases heading to warmer climates for the winter.

Traffic on Sheridan Street is another telltale sign, and the first snows of the year make it clear that the community is much different, and much quieter, than it is during the summer.

It’s not hyperbole to suggest that one could shoot a cannon or roll a bowling ball down Sheridan Street on many a winter night and not be in danger of hitting anything - except perhaps a deer that wandered over to the serene and oft-vacant business district.

We’ve taken steps to liven up our winters and there are more events - the Fun Run, the Ely Winter Festival and Ely Film Festival to name three - to bring people out.

Yet in Ely, winter remains winter, even in years when Mother Nature doesn’t oblige with its usual complement of snow.

The turn of the calendar and the onset of spring also brings some consistency, at least after three decades of observation.

Aprils here are peculiar, and usually pack four seasons worth of weather into 30 days.

The month often begins with snow on the ground, quite often brings stints of mild conditions that bring fast melts, only to be followed by biting winds and often a major snowstorm.

Ely Memorial High School’s Class of 1994 surely remembers its prom, which was held on a Saturday night that followed a storm that cancelled school the day before.

Just last year, there were a few days of warmth and 70-degree readings prior to April 15, only to be followed by snow the ensuing two weekends.

Yet by the end of April, nearly every year, measurable snow is gone and there are signs everywhere that the area has come out of its winter slumber.

We clean out our garages and our yards and take extra trips to the dump.

The parks are suddenly alive with kids and adult frisbee players, and many days there’s activity all at once at the high school baseball, softball and Little League fields.

Downtown and beyond, businesses are reopening, renovating or remodeling, and those summer residents begin to trickle in.

The fishing opener isn’t what it once was in town but it’s another signal that summer is near and so too is our annual influx of visitors.

Sunny mornings often have a chill in the air, but the warmth from above portends that longer, milder and busier days are ahead.

The ice is finally free from area lakes and it won’t be long until it’s hard to cross Sheridan Street from avenues where no traffic signals exist.

Spring always brings changes to the business district, and here at the Echo we’ll do our best to chronicle what’s new in our annual Progress Edition.

A few blocks up, on Sheridan Street, a new sign went up at a familiar eatery that had been closed. Find out about the Frisky Otter, and much more, when we highlight the community’s progress.

Ely has clearly evolved and changed, and the arguments if it’s for the better or worse are clearly in the eye of the beholder.

Yet some things, including the rites of an Ely spring, carry on unchanged.

Once again, like an old bear, we’ve come out of hibernation and the buzz of an again lively town and another Ely summer lay ahead.