April 2016 Posts

Selective Focus: The St. Louis River, Recreation

Apr 08, 2016 1 Comment
Hansi Johnson

Hansi Johnson, untitled

OneRiverMN-Logo-FC-BadgeSomehow this seems both an apt and inapt way to close my editorship of this feature. There are plenty of sites to pore over images of our region’s abundant natural beauty, but few that foreground the real people who live, work, and play here. That was my fundamental ambition; to recognize the vast human capital here, to weekly call for snapshots, pictures of domestic ordinariness, matters not needlessly prettified. Reality, even when it’s harsh is sufficiently beautiful to me.

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Art, Photos ,

American Fur Trading Post at Fond du Lac, 1826

Apr 08, 2016 No Comments

American Fur Trading Post at Fond du Lac 1826

OneRiverMN-Logo-FC-BadgeThis 1950’s-era postcard depicts American Fur Company’s trading post at Fond du Lac, now a neighborhood of Duluth. German-born John Jacob Astor founded the company more than 200 years ago — precisely April 8, 1808. His post on the St. Louis River sought to capitalize on Ojibwe fur trappers in the area, but the Ojibwe preferred to trade with the French and British, so the venture was a bust in the beginning. After the War of 1812, the United States passed a law excluding foreign traders from operating on U.S. territory, which freed the American Fur Company from its biggest competitors. By 1830, Astor’s company dominated the U.S. fur trade.

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History , ,

Duluth Band Profile: Lord Montague

Apr 07, 2016 2 Comments

Lord Montague channels blues and acid rock to produce The Cave. The band opens up about the inspiration behind its work and gives fans a valuable life lesson. Click on the image above to hear the interview.


Music

View on Spirit Lake, Vicinity Duluth and Superior

Apr 06, 2016 2 Comments

View on Spirit Lake 1907

OneRiverMN-Logo-FC-Badge“Dear Ed and Edith,” begins the message on this postcard, mailed July 31, 1907. The penmenship gets funky in places, but the rest goes something like this: “Arrived here last night — fine trip up — leave in a few minutes for Minneapolis, where we remain until Saturday. Everything has been grand. Yes, even the weather. Trust you are full of ??? Lake like-?ess. We would be if we could get a ??? in it. Lovingly, ??? and ???”

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History

Hollywood rumor: Will Ferrell will star in film about snowmobile adventure hatched over drinks at Duluth’s Pickwick

Apr 05, 2016 2 Comments

Ralph PlaistedJust two weeks ago Perfect Duluth Day linked to a New York Times article about Ralph Plaisted’s 1968 expedition to the North Pole by snowmobile. Yesterday the online infotainment website Deadline reported producers Wyck Godfrey and Marty Bowen and actor Will Ferrell will make a movie about the Minnesota adventurers.

“They’ve acquired Guy Lawson’s article for The New York Times Magazine, with a title that tells you everything you need to know: ‘Ice Pack: An Insurance Salesman and a Doctor Walk Into a Bar, and End Up at the North Pole,’ Deadline reports. “They will build the film around Ferrell.”

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News and Current Affairs, Outdoors ,

Skateboarding in Morgan Park School

Apr 05, 2016 2 Comments

Eight skaters, two days, granted permission. R.I.P. Morgan Park, you will be missed.

Shot/edited by Mike Rapaich. Additional video by Stephen Pestalozzi.


Sports, Videos

Aerial Duluth

Apr 05, 2016 No Comments

Jake Moore’s Twin Cities-based video production company RedbellCentral recently completed this Duluth video, with footage from last summer.


Videos

In Defense of Duluth Poets

Apr 05, 2016 No Comments

Holy CowThe arts and culture review website Partisan namedrops Holy Cow! Press of Duluth in an article by Harvard English Professor Stephen Burt titled “In Defence of Minor Poets,” published today. The namedrop occurs without actually mentioning Holy Cow! by name, but instead referencing Duluth with a hyperlink to Consortium Book Sales & Distribution’s page about the Duluth publishing company.

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Art , ,

Duluth/Superior Interstate Bridge: “We are all well”

Apr 05, 2016 1 Comment

We Are All Well 1906 Duluth Postcard

OneRiverMN-Logo-FC-BadgeThis card traveled from Buffalo N.Y. to Mrs. W.J. Morrison of Lindsay, Ont. in 1906.

The Interstate Bridge opened in 1897. At the time it was pretty much the only way to get back and forth between Duluth and Superior — other than by boat or swimming, or going the long way around by land, or maybe jumping a train across the Grassy Point Railroad Bridge.

In 1906, the steamer Troy knocked the draw span of the Interstate Bridge into St. Louis Bay. Ferry service connected the cities for two years until repairs were completed.

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History , ,

Commerce on the River: Symphony Boat Company

Apr 05, 2016 1 Comment

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OneRiverMN-Logo-FC-BadgeMarcel LaFond grew up on Kraemer Lake, about 10 miles west of St. Cloud, where he spent nearly all his time around water and boating. His childhood home was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, which he believes inspired a love of timeless design at an early age. Those influences led him to found Symphony Boat Company three years ago in Duluth’s Riverside neighborhood, where he builds attractive and unique boats from aluminum, marine plywood, foam and epoxy.

“When the economy tanked five or six years ago I found that, like many other people, I was looking to reinvent myself,” he says. Ready to take a risk and follow through with ideas he’d had stewing in his mind for years, LaFond let fate steer him to the St. Louis River.

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News and Current Affairs ,

Hockey Day Minnesota 2016 Videos

Apr 05, 2016 No Comments

Waiting Room Collective produced this short documentary of the Lakeville North boys hockey team traveling to Duluth to play the East Greyhounds during Hockey Day Minnesota at Bayfront Park. The Panthers edged the Greyhounds 3-2. Below is the Fox Sports North video spotlighting the Greyhounds.

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Sports, Videos

Duluth Band Profile: Ingeborg Von Agassiz

Apr 05, 2016 No Comments

Ingeborg Von Agassiz mixes electronic soundscapes with folk undertones. She explains how her solo project began with a 1990s Yamaha keyboard and audience feedback. Click on the image above to hear the interview.


Music , ,

Romance on the St. Louis River

Apr 04, 2016 No Comments

Wooed Near Perch Lake

From The St. Louis River: Diverse Connections at the Duluth Art Institute. #onerivermn


Art

Live Stream from Trump Rally in Superior

Apr 04, 2016 No Comments


News and Current Affairs, Politics

New Alakef CEO launches City Girl Coffee

Apr 04, 2016 2 Comments
Alyza Bohbot poses in front of Alakef's original roaster with City Girl Coffee swag

Alyza Bohbot poses in front of Alakef’s original roaster with City Girl Coffee schwag

Alyza Bohbot never intended to take over Alakef Coffee Roasters, her family’s wholesale coffee roasting business. She was living on the East Coast and had just finished a master’s degree in school counseling when her parents, Nessim and Deborah, told Alyza, their only child, of their retirement plans.

Alyza says she had a “gut check moment.” She realized she didn’t want to see the business her parents worked so hard to build leave the family. She agreed to move back to Minnesota for a six-month trial period to determine if it was a good fit. Three years later, with her parents’ guidance and the help of veteran Alakef staff, Alyza is running the company and taking it in an interesting new direction.

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News and Current Affairs , ,