The Decemberists – “Traveling On”
Portland, Ore.-based indie rock band the Decemberists refer to Duluth in the song “Traveling On,” released in November on an EP of the same name. (more…)
Return of the People’s Free Skate Rink
Max Moen and I did this once before in 2014. This will be open as long as weather permits maintaining it. It is on Lake Superior directly off Leif Erickson Park from the stage, about a quarter mile. It is marked with orange cones which hopefully no one will eff with. Ice is around a foot thick, you could drive a train on it. This is the premier skate course in town, a hundred feet long with many twisty paths. Even if you don’t have skates, it is a great excuse for a party. Bring bikes, kites, beach chairs, flags, capes, etc.
World War I Letter from Alvin T. Anderson of Moose Lake
One hundred years ago my maternal grandfather wrote a letter to his brother. His brother kept it, and eventually it became an item that was photocopied and dispersed to descendents. There’s nothing particularly thrilling in the letter, but it probably qualifies as having at least causal historical significance outside of family interest, so I’ll share it here. (more…)
Mockingbird
I think I read To Kill A Mockingbird for the first time as a Rochester John Marshall 10th grader sometime during the 1986-87 school year. My most prominent memory of the academic experience is writing five-paragraph essays about the book for three buddies who got higher grades on the assignment (all A-minuses) than I got (solid, respectable B). I also remember watching our teacher, the white, perpetually flustered Ms. Green, have no idea what to do when Scott, the only black kid in that sophomore English section, reacted with outrage after the first time she shakily uttered the word “nigger” while reading an excerpt aloud to us.
The book is seldom far from my conscious thoughts. Partially because it’s culturally omnipresent. It’s tough to have a college degree, love reading, work in education, watch public television, or just be alive and engaged in certain aspects of dominant Baby Boomer and Generation-X zeitgeist without seeing, hearing about, or discussing the book (or the movie version of it) fairly frequently. I’m also sure I would think about it fairly often even if it weren’t ubiquitous. I don’t recall much about my actual experience of reading it that first time. I do know I immediately revered the story and many of its characters. I still do. And I’ve consciously thought about it more than usual for the past year or so, after Duluth Public Schools (Independent School District 709) administrators announced the book would be removed from ninth-graders’ English reading list. A lot of people in Duluth and a lot of other places have had a lot things to say about that decision. (more…)
A Walk on the Lake and the Things We Saw
Lake Superior Aquaman reporting. Co-starring my buddy Meghan AKA The Meg
Selective Focus: Steph Anderson
Stephanie Anderson is an illustrator working as The Hillside Creative. She enjoys making detailed, textured drawings with simple tools. And if you’re looking for a pet portrait, she’s ready to help you out.
SA: Ink and watercolor is my medium. There is something that I love about the harsh, black lines of the ink pens in contrast with the free-flowing, vibrant watercolor brush strokes.
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Mayor Larson knows a perfect Duluth day when she sees one
Minneapolis Southwest Journal: “Klobuchar launches 2020 campaign from Boom Island”
A parade of local Democratic officials emphasized that grit as they took turns at the podium in the lead-up Klobuchar’s speech. That included a trio of Minnesota mayors: Jacob Frey of Minneapolis, Johnathan Judd of Moorhead and Duluth Mayor Emily Larson, who described the weather conditions — temperatures in the teens under falling snow — as “a perfect Duluth day.”
Also, from WDIO-TV Eyewitness News: “Klobuchar appears on Good Morning America”
One of the supporters who spoke at the announcement was Emily Larson, mayor of Duluth. “We call this a perfect Duluth Day! Or spring, or summer,” Larson joked with the large crowd.
Breanne Marie & the Front Porch Sinners – “Salt in the Snow”
New music video from Duluth’s Breanne Marie & the Front Porch Sinners, shot at Ely’s Peak and Clyde Iron Works with Kevin Jacobsen.
The band plays Feb. 16 at Klockow Brewing Company in Grand Rapids and March 8 at Blacklist Artisan Ales in Duluth.
Bargaining for love in Duluth
This undated postcard, published by Bamforth & Co., promises requited love in the flower patches of Duluth. Happy Valentine’s Day.
Essentia Fitness & Therapy Center will move to former Younkers
Essentia Health is investing $15 million in the purchase and remodeling of the 145,000-square-foot former Younkers department store at Miller Hill Mall in Duluth. The Essentia Health Fitness & Therapy Center will move into the first floor this fall. Plans are being developed for the rest of the building and will be announced when they are finalized. (more…)
Duluth Album Releases in 2019
Coyote
A Different Path
(Jan. 8)
Available on Bandcamp
T. Dack
Entropic Blue
(Jan. 17)
Available on Bandcamp
Station Ident
Volume One
Xero Music (Jan. 15)
Available on Bandcamp
Irish people try Bent Paddle beer
In the segment above, three pairs of Irish people sample four Minnesota craft beers and offer their opinions. One Duluth beer landed in the mix, Bent Paddle‘s 14° ESB. The beer that won a gold medal at the 2017 Great American Beer Festival elicits opinions from the Irish panel ranging from “It’s like a mouth full of pennies” to “It’s grand.” (more…)
PDD Quiz: Sports Go Sports!
With a nod to the recent Super Bowl (and a Garfunkel and Oates song), this month’s PDD Quiz explores athletics in Duluth. Step up to the plate, sports fan, and see if you can knock this quiz out of the park!
Zenith City Online was an invaluable source of research for this quiz in case you want to cheat study beforehand.
The next PDD quiz, on the happenings that made headlines this month, will be published on Feb. 24. Please email question suggestions to Alison Moffat at aklawite@d.umn.edu by Feb. 21. (more…)
Duluth Public Access Community Television has a new website
Duluth Public Access Community Television has a new website at pacttvduluth.org.
Check it out online or take a tour of the studio, room 328 at Duluth City Hall, 411 W. First St. Call 218-723-3686 to schedule time for a visit and tour.
Rules About Monsters
Monsters are, as you doubtlessly already acutely understand, terribly frightening and dangerous. Many films have been made, detailing the paralyzingly ghastly and gory imperatives on which monsters operate, resulting in rooms fairly brimming with ichor and carnage: Soggy glumps of eyeballs, hanging from sticky ropes of optic nerves like morbid tether balls; piles and piles of viscera, settling and emitting gas like teams of farting snakes; ripped and abandoned limbs, arms and legs stacked like macabre log cabins of ruined flesh and protruding bone, still twitching and dripping the last of their darkening blood. Every shadowy corner, every looming closet, every rickety and ramshackle basement staircase adumbrates the uncanny atrocities monsters are hoping to wreak. They are eager to wreak. It’s their whole mission, in fact. (There’s a perfectly empirical reason for the word “monstrosities,” and it’s precisely what you’re thinking.)
One might reflect on this reality with floppy despondency, and in fairness, one would not be mistaken to do so. Flop and despond, if you need to get it out of your system. But as you’re able, kindly recover your wits, and devote your attention to the following introductory tutorial on the rules by which all monsters must abide, lest they be subjected to the same harrowing and disastrous fates to which they are so devoted to imposing on the human population. (more…)
Selective Focus: Max Mileski
Selective Focus has been a series mostly about visual arts, but there is an undeniable link between music and visuals. This week Max Mileski talks about making music, creating a band and the work that goes into building the sound and the aesthetic that goes with it.
MM: My name is Max Mileski, I work under the nom de plume – Sadkin. I merrily toil with contemporary music as a multi-instrumentalist who writes and records songs in a self contained, d.i.y. manner. Two years ago I released the first collected works of Sadkin, Élan Vital. In speaking more specifically with regards to style, the music is categorized first as Alternative. Within that, there are certainly some subdivisions which help describe the sound ~ Artpop, New Wave, New Romantic, Synthrevival. Most recently and with the help of 4 other inspired souls in Duluth, I’ve been able to take Sadkin to the stage as a live show. The performances have been unquestionably invigorating and has more recently pushed Sadkin into new arenas, exploring deliberate visual components closely tied to the music.
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Clinton’s Critters: How Great Gray Owls Hunt
Clinton Nienhaus, head naturalist for the Friends of Sax-Zim Bog and education director for Hawk Ridge Bird Observatory narrates this video about how Great Gray Owls hunt for voles in winter. Video by Sparky Stensaas.
Monthly Grovel: PDD Calendar holds out its hand again
An important message from Perfect Duluth Day’s Redundant Department of Redundancy:
It takes a lot of geek hours to keep this website going strong. So once a month we set our dignity aside and remind readers how much we appreciate their financial support. (more…)
Redstone redevelopment nearly complete
The mansion that was home to the Congdon family while Glensheen was built is being remodeled into luxury apartments. A news release from Heirloom Property Management announces the majestic Redstone Lofts will have “12 modern style loft apartments and a commercial space that will all be available for lease beginning early 2019.” (more…)
Rachael Kilgour – “Game Changer”
The second single from Duluth native Rachael Kilgour‘s new EP, Game Changer.
Postcards from Neptune
This statue of Neptune stood on the edge of Duluth’s shipping canal from 1959 to 1963. The text on the back of the postcard reads:
Neptune — Symbolic Ruler of the Sea
This statue was given Duluth by the State Fair Board and the land loaned by the Corps of Engineers at Canal Park, Duluth, Minn. to commemorate the arrival of the first deep draft ocean going vessel in to Duluth on May 3, 1959. Neptune was God of the Sea — son of Cronus and Rhea. The Greeks called him Poseidon. He was Jupiter’s brother. Neptune controlled all the waters of the earth and was worshiped by sailors. The 3 prong spear he carried was called Trident.
DLH passenger numbers up 13 percent
Duluth International Airport announced today that 280,865 passengers flew through the facility in 2018, marking a 13 percent increase over 2017.
Both United and Delta saw increases, with United’s addition of the airbus flight in May leading to a nearly 30 percent increase year-over-year.
United offers three daily nonstop flights to Chicago and Delta offers five daily nonstop flights to Minneapolis/St. Paul. American Airlines is set to begin direct service to Chicago on May 23.
“We now have the three largest carriers in the country flying out of DLH,” Tom Werner, the airport’s executive director, said in a news release. “We’re hoping to use that momentum to add Denver to the growing list of places we fly and ways we connect our region to the world.”
Endion Station to be converted into ‘brewtique’ hotel
A former railroad depot will soon become Duluth’s first “brewtique” hotel. (more…)