Former Duluthian Ian Grant travels all over the world as host of the Emmy-award winning series Culture Quest, which looks at “life through the lens of the world’s artists, artisans and keepers of culture.” The latest episode is all about the place Grant spent his childhood in the 1970s and ’80s: Duluth. The show explores how Lake Superior influences the people, culture and stories of the city.
Lisa Fitzpatrick creates a tiny tableau of the St. Louis River estuary in “River Creatures,” an artwork that is part of “The River Speaks” exhibit at Wussow’s Concert Cafe, organized by the St. Louis River Alliance. (Image via the St. Louis River Alliance’s Instagram page.
Duluth-based artist, animator and climate advocate Lisa Fitzpatrick was recognized with an Outstanding Environmental Film Award at the Short. Sweet. Film Fest., an event in Cleveland, Ohio that highlights short features. Her submission, Love Song for Earth, was part of the festival’s environmental program on March 4.
Susan Steger, founder of Steger Mukluks, recounts her history as a winter survival instructor, her 9-month expedition to Ellesmere Island and the 40-year evolution of her iconic footwear brand.
Making it Up North is a PBS North series that explores stories of creative artists, artisans and entrepreneurs engaged in honing their skills, following their passion and realizing their dreams.
Twin Cities realtor Jesse Lynch packed up his video gear, and dog Oscar, for a trip to Duluth and the North Shore of Lake Superior in February following a heavy snowstorm and produced this travelogue, capturing frozen waterfalls and snowy landscapes along the scenic route.
Computer-generated illustration of A & Dubs in Duluth’s Lincoln Park neighborhood courtesy of the restaurant’s Facebook page.
Duluth’s iconic A & Dubs seasonal drive-in restaurant will reopen after sitting idle for two summers. The new owners, Mike Koralia and Ryan Spears, wrote in a post on the A & Dubs Facebook page they plan to announce an opening date soon.
Chris Arnade, a writer who is walking around the world and recently posted about “Walking Duluth,” references the Zenith City in his latest piece, “America and Public Disorder.”
Three weeks ago, in Duluth, half the riders on every bus I took were mentally tortured and/or intoxicated. The downtown Starbucks, pedestrian malls, and shuttered doorways of vacated buildings all housed broken people. Same in Indianapolis, El Paso, New York City, Jacksonville, LA, Phoenix, and almost every community I’ve been to in the U.S., save for those gated by wealth.
Experience all the gold medal salad from St. Paul and see who earned their spot on the FLOWdium. John King and Pulltab Sports present an Olympic-themed hockey hair-a-lympics full of salad shenanigans from the Minnesota State High School Hockey Tournament.
Oh, Duluth.
It began with watching addicts scream in the alley. Then it got electric. Then it got louder.
I’m not sure where it’s going, but I know how it ends.
Climate>Duluth host Tone Lanzillo interviews Shodo Spring, author of Open Reality: Meeting the Polycrisis Together With All Beings.” The program was recorded in the Duluth Public Access Community Television studio.
Not much is known about the six postcards featured here, but they all have appeared in recent eBay sales by LL Vintage Antiques of St. Paul. They are collected in this post simply because they are of a similar style and are cards that haven’t appeared on Perfect Duluth Day before.
Amanda Agamaite, left, and Ben Hugus of Ursa Minor Brewing stand in front of the future home of Bean & Bear Bagels. The Lincoln Park brewery is remodeling the north end of its production facility at 202 S. 26th Ave. W. A deck will be built in the current parking lot. (Photo by Mark Nicklawske)
A Lincoln Park brewery famous for its beer and wood-fired pizza combination is opening a new restaurant space that will specialize in made-from-scratch bagels for the breakfast and lunch crowd.
Ursa Minor Brewing will open Bean & Bear Bagels, a grab-and-go bagel shop, on the north end of its brewery and warehouse facility at 202 S. 26th Ave. W. this spring. The new location will feature fresh bagels, bagel sandwiches and specialty coffee.
Visual artist Catherine Meier shares her journey from hauling cattle across the Great Plains to creating deeply immersive animations and drawings on Minnesota’s North Shore.
Making it Up North is a PBS North series that explores stories of creative artists, artisans and entrepreneurs engaged in honing their skills, following their passion and realizing their dreams.
The new song and video from Cloud Cult “feels like the prelude birthing of a new album,” according to bandleader Craig Minowa’s description on YouTube. “The ground this new musical nursery stands on was Ho Chunk. The Kickapoo River hugs this recording studio on three sides and is considered by some geologists to be one of the oldest in the world — 2 million years. There is spirit here, and it has stories to tell.”
Germany’s Osten-Hemmoor Bridge with a postcard of Duluth’s transporter bridge in the foreground. (Photo by Matthew James; postcard from the University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, University Archives)
Growing up in Duluth, I often heard that the lift bridge was the only bridge of its type in the world. I later learned that the world is full of lift bridges. Wikipedia lists 137 of them. But that doesn’t mean the claim isn’t true. The lift bridge was once a transporter bridge, a far more rare type of bridge. Aside from various hand-cranked bridges that basically amount to art projects, fewer than two dozen transporter bridges have ever been built anywhere in the world. Only eight of those are still in use. And the world only has one converted transporter bridge in operation: Duluth’s Aerial Lift Bridge. This Duluth Deep Dive takes a closer look at what Duluth’s bridge was like before its conversion by recounting my visit to two of the world’s remaining transporter bridges. One is the closest surviving counterpart to Duluth’s original canal bridge. The other gives a sense what the Duluth bridge might have looked like if the city had modernized the gondola instead of making the conversion to a lift bridge.
