This Week: raptors, rockers, rhubarb and more
Here’s a bit of what you’ll find in this week’s PDD Calendar:
The United Way kicks of its 21st Day of Caring, the Brothers Burn Mountain play as part of the Chester Creek Concert Series, the latest episode of Take it with You takes place at the Underground, the Superior Public Library is the place to learn about and meet a raptor, Moors & McCumber ushers in the 2016 Bayside Concert Series, Charlie Parr and Kyle Ollah raise money for the 310 Film Project and the comic opera Les Uncomfortables opens.
The Cat in the Hat narrates the story of Horton and the Whos at the Duluth Playhouse, the 12th annual Chum Rhubarb Festival is the place for rhubarb burritos, the Far West Fest 2016 turns Gary-New Duluth into party central, the Park Point Art Fair returns with art and music and food, Duluth Celebrity Game Night goes down at the Underground and Andrew Kirov tapes the pilot episodes of his talk show Twin Ports Tonight.
Price Check: Duluth Coffee Company’s Peru Cajamarca Norte
Duluth Coffee Company launched as a boutique wholesale roaster in 2011 and expanded to open a retail café in Downtown Duluth in 2012. The café sells roasted coffees, brewing devices, grinders and coffee brewed by the cup to order.
Peru Cajamarca Norte is a full-city roast grown in Cajamarca, Peru. There is some oil on the surface of the bean, whereas light roasts have no oil and dark roasts are oily. Other characteristics of this coffee are heavy body and bitterness, with a rich and dark color. Duluth Coffee Company roasts beans onsite in a 3-kilo roaster, exposing the beans to higher temperatures for a darker roast. (more…)
Shaunna Heckman – “Wandering Girl”
Shaunna Heckman performed her electronica music in KUMD‘s Studio A prior to her appearance at the Homegrown Music Festival last month.
Phantom Ship Kickstarter
Scott Gusts moved from Minneapolis to Walker in 2012 with plans to release a new Phantom Ship record inspired by his time spent on Lake Superior and in northern Minnesota. He’s running a Kickstarter for the project, which is halfway funded with five days to go. (more…)
Fathers, Sons and the Use of Force
I have no memories of my father or the life my mother, sister, father and I lived until age four. Our home was in the middle of the city, but it was so old, it used to be the center of a farm. The garage had lived a former life as a barn, with hay lofts refitted for storing unused garden tools.
I don’t remember my parents’ divorce. In kindergarten, I understood that my mother filed, and that my grandparents moved in with us, because my mother was afraid that he would hurt her. By middle school, I understood the kind of hurt she feared.
My father is my paradigm case of what it means for a man to use force.
I’ve been thinking about the use of force. And every June, I think hard about fatherhood. The thinking is coming together this year.
Christian thinker and philosopher Simone Weil describes force as something that “turns anybody who is subjected to it into a thing.” She is writing about Homer’s Iliad, a poem about war, the force that turns men into corpses. But she goes beyond war to talk about the threat of force as well. (more…)
Selective Focus: Joel Cooper
I’ve been fascinated by screenprinting for a long time, because I’ve done it, and I know how difficult and frustrating the process can be. Joel Cooper tells us about his process for this week’s Selective Focus.
JC: I am a silkscreen printer. I became interested in this medium when attending a workshop at the Duluth Art Institute in the late ’80s. I guess the whole process appeals to me. It fits my personality … It is slow. Each color is drawn with black ink on acetate using a pen or brush, exposed to a screen, and using oil based ink squeeged to sheets of archival paper. The colors are layered one on top of the other starting with the lightest and ending usually with black. Most prints take well over a month start to finish. I take a lot of photos to get ideas in the summer and save the printing for our long cold winters. My style would be considered representational. (more…)
A week of art, music and singles mingling
How do I catch you up on the past week, PDD?
Last Thursday, I went to the reopening of the Tweed. Mayor Larson was there, exciting. Ken Bloom directs one of the most significant cultural resources in the region. Bill Payne‘s tenure as Dean of the School of Fine Arts at UMD made great things possible for the Tweed, too. (more…)
Aerial Bridge from end of Ship Canal
The message on the back of this postcard, mailed April 3, 1909, might require an interpreter — as often seems to be the case. (more…)
Northern Lights at Boulder Lake Dam
Time lapse photography by Grant Johnson of the tail end of the Mother’s Day Northern Lights at Boulder Lake Dam near Duluth.
Paddling in and around Lake Superior
Highlights from a year of paddling in and around Lake Superior — St. Louis, Lester, Cascade, Beaver and Baptism rivers; Lester point break, Duluth and Apostle Islands.
Team Dilly
Video by Matt Thompson.
Video Archive: Mayor Bergson says he won’t seek re-election
This clip from KDLH-TV 3 is from 10 years ago — June 14, 2006 — the day Duluth Mayor Herb Bergson announced he would not seek re-election the following year in order to focus on solving the city’s unfunded retiree health-care liability without politics interfering. At the time, the city’s health-care debt was projected to reach $300 million by 2014.
In early 2007, Bergson hinted he might run again after all, then announced two months later that he wouldn’t, only to reverse course three months after that and file to run.
His opponents in the race were Charlie Bell, Meg Bye, Joanne Fay, Greg Gilbert, Todd Gremmels, Sunny Helbacka, Reiner Nelson, Don Ness, Jim Pratt, John Socha and Robert Wagner. Bell and Ness advanced to the General Election, with Ness ultimately replacing Bergson as mayor.
Public comment sought on EAW for Spirit Mountain projects
The city of Duluth is accepting public comments until July 13 on an environmental assessment worksheet that was prepared for proposed projects at Spirit Mountain Recreation Area in 2016-2017. The plans include Nordic cross-country ski trails, mountain bike trails, Superior Hiking Trail extensions, rail-to-trail conversion, and an 18-hole disc golf course.
The proposed projects would initiate when all permits and approvals are received. They are part of the St. Louis River Corridor Initiative aimed at revitalizing and enhancing recreational opportunities and appropriate development in the western corridor of Duluth. (more…)
St. Louis River Story: Sheila Packa
People in the St. Louis River watershed shared their connection to the river with WDSE-TV during the opening reception for The St. Louis River: Diverse Connections at the Duluth Art Institute. In this installment, Sheila Packa shares her poem “St. Louis River Route.”
Midnight Movies at 7 – New Film Series at Zinema 2
In August Zeitgeist Arts Cafe and the Duluth Film Collective are launching a new film series: Midnight Movies at 7. The series will focus on cult classics, genre favorites, and films that are so bad they’re great.
First up in the series is Miami Connection, a 1980s tale of ninjas, rock ‘n’ roll, and taekwondo. The film will screen for one night only: Tuesday, August 9 at 7 p.m.
This Week: worms, wildflowers, whippersnappers and more
Here’s a bit of what you’ll find in this week’s PDD Calendar:
There’s a public meeting on the Can of Worms reconstruction plans, people can learn how to use a hand plane at Duluth MakerSpace, the folks behind the upcoming WDSE documentary Lost Superior are looking for stories, the Trans+ support group is holding its biweekly meeting on Tuesday, Teague Alexy plays the first show of the 34th Chester Creek Concert Series and it’s again time for the monthly Minecraft event at the Duluth Public Library.
Wednesday is “no kids allowed” night at World of Wheels Skate Center in Superior, the Duluth Art Institute is saying “thank you” to its members via the annual Art Night Out, Bagley Nature Center is the place to be if you like hiking and/or wildflowers, and it’s Grandma’s Marathon Weekend — which is a great time to get your young whippersnapper involved in racing, or to see a bunch of local and national music acts.
Denfeld Senior Graduation Video 2016
A shot-by-shot re-make of Justin Timberlake’s “Can’t Stop the Feelin’!” produced by Denfeld High School’s graduating class of 2016.
PDD Quiz: Happy Birthday to Us!
[This post originally contained an embedded quiz created on the platform Qzzr. It is no longer available at its source.]
June 29 will be PDD’s 13th birthday. How much do you know about our 13 glorious years of being Duluth’s Duluthiest website? Take the quiz to find out.
And join us at Vikre Distillery on June 29 for PDDXIII: Perfect Duluth Day’s 13th Birthday Party. Here’s a link to the Facebook invite.
Superior Siren – “Trying Too Hard”
Superior Siren performing “Trying Too Hard” at KUMD last month promoting the Homegrown Music Festival. Listen to the interview at kumd.org.
Down Town
“I’m from New Jersey, I don’t expect too much
If the world ended today I would adjust.”
–John Gorka
New York, New Jersey. San Francisco, Oakland. Duluth and Soup Town. The Deep North, top of the map, and shallow end of the gene pool. Ugly sister-city. Can you feel the gravitational pull of the swamp it was built on? This force that bends us, slouching like the lowland willows. That drives water, beer and whiskey to seek the lower ground. Rains and fortunes falling, down and down. The banker’s son becomes a biker. The executive’s boy delivers pizza and sells dope well into adulthood. Sociologists call this “regression toward the mean.” Or maybe the swamp is pulling them. Down.
Of course the place tosses off an astronaut or Nobel winner once in a while. But folks mostly seem to understand they were born in second-place, and second place, as we know, is first loser. You get used to it. It helps to have negative role-models. Don’t do what he did. Look out for that. Rest in peace. (more…)
Walt Whitman’s Poem About Duluth?
There’s a new posting at the Reference@Duluth blog that involves a little literary detective work:
The Duluth Daily News of March 30, 1892, printed a letter offering an unpublished poem by Walt Whitman. The letter writer claims that Whitman had visited Duluth for his health the previous summer and had been so impressed with the Zenith City that he wrote a poem in praise of Duluth and had sent it to a friend in town.
Quiet (Singles) Night at the Depot
I spent Wednesday night at the St. Louis County Depot.
It was singles night, a weekly event in June. The event included $1 Castle Danger beers and entertainment from DJ Trivia. The event included free tickets to local events from KQDS and some locally owned restaurants and some tickets to Tribute Fest (I won three — anyone want to go? I feel no desire to pay tribute to any of the bands being covered.). The highlight of the event: a package to Las Vegas. (more…)
Selective Focus: Nate Lindstrom
“Awaiting”, Sunrise along the North Shore
You may have seen Nate Lindstrom’s photography at art festivals or through his annual calendar. For this week’s Selective Focus, Nate tells us about his landscape photography.
NL: It felt like it took a lot of experimenting, some minor frustrations and a heap of learning to make landscapes my photographic focus, but in hindsight that interest developed a long time ago. I’ve always had a love of nature and being outdoors and moving to a very outdoor-centered area of Minnesota helped me look at my surroundings in a different way. I was spending more time on trails, on the shore, sleeping in our many state parks, living through the hottest 10 days of our summer and diabolical winters. All of these things inspire what I look for in a subject or composition, and shape my overall style. (more…)
Tennis courts by MacArthur School coming along
Seven tennis courts and a discus/shotput-throwing area look to be almost ready at 725 N. Central Ave. The new courts and field will be used by tennis and track teams from Denfeld, as well as physical education students and other community members.