Last updated on May 18, 2025
If you’ve never heard of White Cap, you’ve missed the greatest snowwoman legacy in Vermont history.
White Cap was a community in the Vermont Mountains where everybody knew everyone else’s business. The snowman or snowwoman in the center of White Square was a tradition in the town. It was such a comedic event that, each year, it marked the beginning of the long, cold winter nights and wind-swept days. Each year, the town would alternate between a snowman and a snowwoman—whoever heard of that except the people of White Cap—so both sexes could enjoy a laugh at the expense of the other. One year, the townsfolk dressed a five-foot snowwoman in a bikini. This year was no different, but had the tomfoolery gone too far?
Harry and Hilda stood at the edge of White Square with their daughter, Sky, and dog, Gracie. Hilda pretended to admire the snowwoman dressed in her hat and scarf. She had won the hat in a hat contest, but Gracie had eaten the pom-poms off. The half-eaten hat and the old scarf made for a funny-looking snowwoman, but it was the other “thing” that wasn’t funny that had Hilda sniffling.
Everyone laughed when they found out Hilda had broken her nose when a frozen pop tart popped out of the toaster and smacked her on the nose. Whoever heard of a frozen pop tart breaking someone’s nose?
Of course, in White Cap, such hilarity spread quickly. Now Hilda was the talk of Whitecap, and her memory would forever be etched in White Cap history as the snowwoman who broke her nose from a frozen pop tart.
Harry squeezed his wife around the waist. “Honey, don’t be upset about it. It will heal, and all will be forgotten.”
“Suppose it doesn’t heal straight?” she sobbed. “If only we had the money …”
“I’ll love you even if you have a crooked nose,” her husband said.
Hilda stared at her insensitive husband and then stole away from his embrace. Puckering her lips in disgust, she stomped home in the snow. Did she believe in miracles? She could try, even though they never seemed to happen to her.
“Mommy, I’ll still love you, too,” Sky assured her.
Hilda turned to see her daughter running toward her. Even the dog, Gracie, seemed to sense something was out of whack.*
Later that night, Sky read her Bible before going to bed. Unexpectedly, her eyes fell on a passage that made her heart pound. “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it will be opened to you.” *
Sky wrote on her bedside notepad, “Dear Jesus, can you give Mommy some money to fix her nose?”
The following day was Sunday, but Sky was sick with a sore throat, so the family couldn’t attend church. Sky was the most upset of everybody. She had planned to put the little prayer she wrote in the offering plate at church. But now she couldn’t do that. Angry with God, she picked up the note she had written the night before, crumpled it, and threw it on the floor. Then she buried her face in the pillow, sobbing.
*
Sensing the note’s importance, Gracie picked it up and ran out the bedroom door, into the laundry room, and out the doggie door. She hurried down the street to the snowwoman, jumped up to pull the hat down, and put Sky’s prayer inside it. Then, she headed straight to church in the drifting snow.
Upon arriving, the dog entered the front door and sat like an angel in the back pew. The townspeople knew her, so they patted her on the head as they passed to take their seats.
“Where is the family?” one woman asked. But nobody knew.
As soon as Pastor Tom prayed for the offering, Gracie raced up to the front of the church with the hat in her mouth. Everyone stared. No dog had ever made an offering before, so every eye had to see what this was all about.
“Gracie,” Pastor Tom said, “What’s in your mouth?”
She set the hat in front of the pastor and waited. He opened the small note and read the words that Sky had written. Gracie watched as the congregation listened to the words. Everyone fell silent.
Suddenly, a man stood, clearing his throat. “We shouldn’t have mocked the poor woman by making the snowwoman look like her with the broken nose. We are the ones with our noses out of whack. We need to make things straight.”
Women opened their purses and men their wallets, and by the end of the service, all the money needed for Hilda’s surgery had been raised. After church, with big smiles and happy faces, the congregation headed to Sky’s house with the special gift.
To this day, a small statue stands where the snowwoman once stood as a remembrance that God answers prayer. And on its angelic face is the most beautiful nose that Hilda could have ever imagined.
*Matthew 7:7 NKJV
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