Sweetland on Ice’s season skated in Friday afternoon with its ribbon cutting ceremony at Sweetland Amphitheatre at Boyd Park.

LaGrange resident Myrtice Adcock was the first person to skate on the rink. Sweetland Amphitheatre Director Becca Eiland said Adcock was chosen because she famously skated on the fountain in downtown in 1970. Adcock also skated the fountain in 2010 during another freeze.

“A lot of folks do mention having seen my picture,” Adcock said.

Eiland said Sweetland on Ice was created for the amphitheater to provide entertainment in the winter.

“When we sat back and sort of looked at our calendar year and what Sweetland serves our community in the summer months. We saw that there was a tremendous opportunity to do something in the winter,” Eiland said. “We put our heads together and came up with this idea of the ice skating rink.”

According to Eiland, while it is held outside, the ice is kept frozen through a chiller machine and the rink has insulation around it for the daytime. A tent is expected to protect it for most of the winter.

In addition to the rink, the amphitheater will also have a beer tent for adults to enjoy. The amphitheater already serves alcohol for other events.

“Sweetland handles the beers and wines for our concert events, and I had been to a number of other ice skates doing my homework and saw just about all of them had that aspect,” she said. “It was sort of a nice touch for parents who want to make an evening of it with their children and just to have somewhere to go and relax while their kids skate, and so we thought that would be a great asset to get people to come and stay a little bit longer than they normally would.”

Mayor Jim Thornton said Sweetland Amphitheatre is a great asset for the city and that the rink will bring in more people.

“I think it’s going to be a great attraction, it’s really going to bring the young people out in LaGrange giving them something else to do, and maybe some older people too will give it a try,” Thornton said.

Eiland said that Friday was just the beginning of what will hopefully be a success.

“Like anything new that happens at Sweetland, be patient with us, we’re still working out the kinks, but know that with everything we do, we’ll work on getting better with time,” she said.

Sweetland on Ice is open Tuesday and Thursday from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m., Friday from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m., Saturday from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. and Sunday from 1 to 8 p.m. The beer tent is open Thursday through Saturday.