The History Channel website mentions Duluth today in its “This Day in History” feature, pointing out that Duluth Mayor Gary Doty cut the ribbon opening the 1,480-foot–long Leif Erickson Tunnel on Interstate 35 on Oct. 28, 1992.
And now, a little something for the ladies. The St. Louis Hotel was Duluth’s premier lodging establishment in the 1880s. It stood where the Medical Arts Building is today.
Developer Mike Poupore stands outside the historic Northwestern Bell Telephone building at 1804 E. First St. The building housed the RecyclaBell all-ages music venue from 1993-1997. (Photo by Mark Nicklawske)
A look inside a newly-restored building that helped foster the 1990s Duluth indie rock scene is featured in a series of historic property video tours launched on the internet this week.
The Duluth Preservation Alliance explores changes in five iconic properties that once served city businesses and local government during a 2021 Virtual Historic Properties Tour available now on its website. The project provides a first look inside the newly remodeled Northwestern Bell telephone exchange building at 1804 E. First St. — which later housed an unlikely but locally significant music venue called the RecyclaBell from 1993 to 1997.
My complete 13-part comic strip originally published in Duluth’s Transistor circa 2008. Much information from E. Jean Carroll’s book, Hunter: The Strange and Savage Life of Hunter S. Thompson. In addition to ripping off Frank Miller, I copied several panels from X-Men comics, and some Hunter photos.
A few week’s back Duluth Urbex slithered through Nopeming, the former sanatorium located west of Duluth in Midway Township. The resulting video is a perfect primer for the Halloween creeps.
Keeping Duluth’s shipping channels open requires occasional dredging. This undated postcard offers a look at the process in the early 20th century.
About once a year, satirical news website the Onion references Duluth in a story. The 2021 example appears in a list of “What Your Partner Is Actually Thinking During Sex,” published this week.
Split Rock Lighthouse stands along the western shore of Lake Superior, atop a soaring cliff. Dressed in cream-colored brick and elegant trim more fitting for a grand house in a genteel neighborhood, it once worked as a watchman holding a luminous light, warning ships about rocky shores at its feet.
It’s a crisp late-October morning. The last day of the season before the lighthouse shutters for the year. From an expansive autumn-blue sky, sunshine washes the landscape in gold. The temperature wanders just north of forty-five degrees. The air breathes softly.
My granddaughter, six, and grandson, four, are with me. It’s their first visit to the lighthouse. Because it’s a weekday and almost the last day the lighthouse will entertain visitors for the year, we are nearly alone on the grounds.
We climb the twisting steps of the lighthouse, just the three of us. We are quiet, and with nothing to arrest my attention, other than the shuffle of feet on the stairs, I travel decades back in time.
Here’s a look at a pair of East Fourth Street buildings — one soon to be demolished, another already lost to history. The photos on the left in the side-by-sides above are from Oct. 22, 2011. The ones on the right are from Oct. 22, 2021.
Duluth-born troubadour David Dondero performed at Wussow’s Concert Cafe on Tuesday. One of his new songs mentions the Zenith City and a variety of Minnesota locations. The song was penned in 2019 and hasn’t appeared on any official releases, but the demo track linked here was posted to Patreon.
I’m still working on my literary history of Duluth. Lake Superior Writers has published or co-published several volumes. If you were involved in some of these collections and have stories to share, message me or comment below.
An article published this week in the online magazine Slate explores the letters exchanged circa 1940 between a Superior librarian, Edith Carlson, and the staff of Frank Lloyd Wright. She wanted the famed architect to design her modest home. It got as far as preliminary sketches and building instructions.
The neo-noir film Lonely Hearts was released 15 years ago today — Oct. 21, 2006. In the clip above, John Travolta and James Gandolfini — as detectives Elmer Robinson and Charles Hilderbrandt, respectively — disregard a letter from “Meredith from Duluth.”
Duluth’s Charlie Parr released a new album in July — Last of the Better Days Ahead. The video for “817 Oakland Avenue” features animation by Drew Christie.
