Ice Palace

Ice Palace is a 1960 Technicolor historical drama adventure film directed by Vincent Sherman and adapted from a novel of 1958 written by Edna Ferber. The film stars Richard Burton, Robert Ryan, Carolyn Jones and Martha Hyer. It dramatizes the debate over Alaska statehood. Alaska had become a state in 1959. Plot The film tells the story of Zeb Kennedy and Thor Storm, Alaska settlers in the period following World War I. Kennedy works his way up through the Alaskan fish cannery business, befriending Wang, a Chinese worker, and Storm, an idealistic fishing boat captain. Kennedy and Storm begin to plan a cannery together in the Alaskan town of Baranof, when Kennedy falls for Bridie Ballantyne, Storm's fiancée. The feeling is reciprocated, but Kennedy chooses money over love, marrying Seattle heiress Dorothy Wendt. When Storm discovers his disappointed fiancée's infidelity, he punches out Kennedy and flees into the wilderness on a dog sled. Kennedy launches a packing company in Baranof, hiring Wang as well as his old friend, Dave Husack. His feelings for Ballantyne, now abandoned by her fiancé, are no secret to his wife. The Kennedys give birth to a daughter, Grace. Storm returns to Baranof with an infant son, Christopher, born to an Eskimo wife who died after labor. Over the following years, Storm comes to resent Kennedy for his cannery's use of salmon traps, which are depleting the salmon population and putting fishermen out of business. Meanwhile, their children, Christopher and Grace, begin a romance. Kennedy tells Storm to keep his "half-breed kid" away from his daughter. Storm, drawing on the support of fishermen and Alaska natives, becomes a candidate for the Alaska Territorial Legislature on a platform advocating statehood and opposing the excesses of business mogul "Czar" Kennedy. Christopher and Grace elope to live among Christopher's maternal relations in the village of Anavak. Grace's mother, Dorothy Kennedy dies.