The hundreds of snowman figurines on display at a Kansas mall might look alike, but each was important to Kathy Allen Duncan.
Some are skiing, others are caroling in front of houses or lounging in the snow made from cotton. A handful are using the bathroom.
For five decades, Kathy created detailed snowman displays in her home with the roughly 1,000 figurines she collected. But the tradition was in peril when Kathy, 73, died in September of complications from diabetes.
Her husband, R.E. “Tuck” Duncan, looked back at photos of Kathy’s displays before her funeral. He recalled thinking, “We need to build one more, one last one.” He wanted to share it not just with his family, but also with all of Topeka, Kan.
Tuck, 74, rented a vacant store at a local shopping mall where he and other family members created an exhibit showing hundreds of Kathy’s snowmen — which she called “snowpeople” — enjoying the winter. There’s a banner that reads: “KATHY ALLEN DUNCAN’S SNOWPEOPLE VILLAGE.” Another poster shows Kathy’s obituary.
Kathy’s family said their goal was to spread joy — something they said Kathy did daily — to as many people as possible. They exceeded their expectations.
Thousands of people have visited the free exhibit, Tuck told the Washington Post. More than 1 million people have seen photos of it on social media, where one user wrote:
“Guys I’m sobbing a local woman passed away in September and her husband/family rented a whole store at the mall to show off her Christmas decorations nothing is for sale it’s literally just so everyone can see it and it’s so beautiful I love.”
Kathy took decorating seriously as a way to express love for the people she cared for, said Joro Martin, who was raised by Kathy and Tuck after he said he left a troubled household.
“Mom was a safe space for so many people, and what is created there is a safe space to share,” Martin said about the mall exhibit.
Kathy built her first snowman display on a card table in a one-bedroom apartment in December 1974, shortly after she and Tuck got married. There were only a handful of figurines — she had picked up the hobby of collecting them from her grandmother — and she hoped they would bring smiles to visitors.
Kathy collected more snowman figurines over the years from antique booths, craft shows, flea markets, and Hallmark stores.
There’s a wax candle shaped like a snowman — one of Kathy’s oldest figurines — which has faded paint. There’s one with glasses that Kathy joked was the snowman version of Tuck, an attorney, so the figurine always stood outside a law office in her displays.
Some are dressed as firefighters, nurses, police officers, chefs, and musicians. Others wear crimson-and-blue clothes to match the colors of her alma mater, the University of Kansas.
They are built from a wide range of materials, including yarn, plastic, ceramic, cotton, and wood.
Kathy started building the display each year after Thanksgiving and finished around Christmas Eve, when the family ate dinner off snowman-themed tableware. She started the display by covering the table with cotton and sprinkling artificial snow on top, then she placed shelves in the back to resemble mountains.
The displays moved from the roughly 34-by-34-inch card table to a 3-by-6-foot table to two adjoining 3-by-6-foot tables.
Kathy changed the setting each year. She created rural towns with recreational vehicles, cities with clustered buildings, and ice skating rinks with bridges. One year — even though Kathy pointed out that snowmen can’t survive warm weather — she let their youngest son, Ryan Duncan, build a beach.
Outside the holidays, Kathy and Tuck initially rented a storage unit for the figurines. For the past two decades, snowmen filled half of their garage. But that didn’t mean the snowman decorations were absent in the condo: Kathy had a four-foot-tall metal snowman in the atrium that waved year-round.
“I can’t remember a Christmas, a holiday — shoot, I can’t remember a July — without something with snowmans in it,” Ryan said.
About a month after Kathy died, Tuck rented the second-floor space in Topeka’s West Ridge Mall near a Petland and a Spencer’s store. Tuck hired movers to transport 60 plastic boxes of snowman figurines there.
Tuck and his family placed plywood, a foam board, buffalo cotton, and white and blue sparkles atop a 8-by-16-foot table.
At the front of the display, they set up a water tower with a snowman head serving as the tank. There’s a lake made of foil. Houses and trees are scattered throughout. Some small pieces of cotton even represent snowman poop.
The family finished the display and opened the room Nov. 25. Local news WIBW-TV covered the story.
There’s a Christmas tree by the front window that holds about 50 snowman ornaments and eight tables on the edges of the room displaying more figurines and snowman-themed items like calendars and quilts.
“The snow people you see throughout this village and around the room were lovingly collected by Kathy Allen Duncan over the past fifty years,” a poster in the room reads. “In her honor, the Duncan and Allen families have gathered them here with the same care and affection, celebrating the joy they brought to her life.”
The project cost about $15,000, Tuck said, “and it’s worth every penny.” Many people are learning about his wife, who he said fed peanuts and corn to wild squirrels and who, even in her final days, was still asking about the well-being of others.
A family member opens the mall room every morning and closes it at night. While the exhibit evokes memories that make Tuck emotional — like remembering his 5-foot tall wife trying to grab boxes of snowman figurines from the top of the garage — Tuck said talking about Kathy with visitors has been cathartic.
He has an ornament on his Christmas tree that says, “Those we love don’t go away, they walk beside us everyday.”
The display will close on Christmas Eve. Afterward, family members — including the couple’s oldest son Spencer, the mayor-elect of Topeka — will take the snowmen back to their homes. Then, the whole family plans to build their own small snowman displays in Kathy’s memory.
