Video: A mountain lion in northern Minnesota

PDDTV May 29, 2024 No Comments

This video of a mountain lion just south of Voyageurs National Park was captured on April 16. The trail-camera footage is from the Voyageurs Wolf Project, which is focused on understanding the summer ecology of wolves in the park. This is the third video of a mountain lion the project’s cameras have captured in the past three years. All three animals seemed to be wandering through and were only caught on camera once before they appeared to leave the area.


Outdoors

Duluth 2024 Primary Election Primer

PDD News Sieve May 28, 2024 No Comments

The filing period for candidates running for federal, state and county offices in Minnesota is from May 21 to June 4. The primary election is Aug. 13; the general election is Nov. 5.

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News and Current Affairs, Politics

PDD Quiz: May 2024

Alison Moffat May 27, 2024 No Comments

See how many of this month’s headlines and happenings you remember with this week’s current events quiz!

The next PDD Quiz, scheduled for June 16, will test your knowledge of the Superior Hiking Trail. Please submit question suggestions to Alison Moffat at [email protected] by June 11.

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News and Current Affairs

The Final Resting Place of Private John Matthew McGillis

Matthew James May 27, 2024 No Comments

Left: Private John Matthew McGillis, photo courtesy of Jasper van Kampen. Right: His burial place (Photo by Matthew James)

John Matthew McGillis, known to his family on Duluth’s Park Point as Jack, died on Christmas Day 1944, one day before the end of major fighting in the final German offensive of World War II. He wasn’t a combat soldier.

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History ,

Rachael Kilgour – “Heart on Fire” (live at The Current)

PDDTV May 26, 2024 No Comments

Duluth native Rachael Kilgour visited The Current studio for a session hosted by Radio Heartland’s Mike Pengra. She played three songs from her 2023 album My Father Loved Me, including the track featured here, “Heart on Fire.”


Music, Videos

Jesus Christ Meets Bob Dylan in a Hotel Room in Tucson, 1978

Jim Richardson (aka Lake Superior Aquaman) May 25, 2024 7 Comments

Bob: I’m ready to accept you, Lord.

Jesus: Not so fast there Bob. I need you to do something first.

Bob: Name it Lord.

Jesus: I need you to rub out Jimmy Gravante.

Bob (stunned): The hitman?

Jesus: Your successor in the Duluth family, after you got out and became — this (gestures around). You know Jimmy — the sniper who blew you off your motorcycle in 1966 in Woodstock.

Bob: He hit the bike, man, not me. Sniper my ass.

Jesus: I’m going to need you to check your tone.

Bob: I’m sorry Lord. It’s just that he wasn’t even at 200 yards. He’s more like a potshot expert than a sniper. And my divorce is killing me. I just got off a world tour and my adrenal glands feel squeezed dry like little raisins. Think I’m coming down with something (sniffles).

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Random ,

Dirty Knobs – “More Fire in More Places”

PDDTV May 24, 2024 No Comments

“More Fire in More Places” is the fourth release from the new Dirty Knobs album, Songs About Everything Dying Around Us, Including Us.


Music, Videos

Smelt parade seeks new leader as founder retires

Delaney Shipman May 22, 2024 No Comments

Run, Smelt, Run! Parade photo via Magic Smelt Puppet Troupe Facebook page.

Dressing up as a silver fish in late spring could become weird again. After eleven years of marches normalizing smelt fashion on the Lake Superior boardwalk, the annual Run, Smelt, Run! Parade could be making its final march on May 26.

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Events

The Slice: Naming Life Parade and Deep Fake Five

PDDTV May 22, 2024 No Comments

Cameron Mathews explains how the bands Life Parade and Deep Fake Five got their names.

In its series The Slice, PBS North presents short “slices of life” that capture the events and experiences that bring people together and speak to what it means to live up north.


Music, Videos , ,

The Will and the Way

David Beard May 22, 2024 3 Comments

Judy Gibbs introduced me to The Will and the Way series of books about the creation of a number of Duluth institutions.

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History ,

Postcards from Passage Island Lighthouse at Isle Royale

Paul Lundgren May 21, 2024 No Comments

This undated postcard, published by the E.C. Kropp Company, shows Passage Island Lighthouse and the rugged shore at Isle Royale on Lake Superior.

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History , , ,

Sarah Seidelmann and Her Spirit Guides

Cheryl Reitan May 20, 2024 No Comments

Sarah Seidelman in her studio.

Sarah Seidelmann is one of the four Arrowhead regional artists selected for the Grand Marais Art Colony Studio 21 Gallery this summer. She premiers her work at her exhibit, Making Love Visible beginning with the June 1 opening event. The show is on display through June 29.

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Art

PDD Geoguessr Challenge #18: Duluth’s Sister Cities – Thunder Bay, Canada

Matthew James May 19, 2024 No Comments

Thunder Bay, Canada. Photo based on an interpretation of aerial imagery by Microsoft Flight Simulator.

The last of the sister cities in this series is the first. Thunder Bay was the original sister city of Duluth, a relationship that formally began in 1980. While the Twin Ports is the largest metropolitan area on Lake Superior, Thunder Bay is the largest city, with a population of 110,000.

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News and Current Affairs ,

Bob Dylan on Duluth and Minnesota

Jim Richardson (aka Lake Superior Aquaman) May 18, 2024 3 Comments

Some Duluthians think Bob Dylan hates Duluth and Minnesota. What has Bob Dylan actually said?

I’d heard rumors Dylan was a Duluth hater, but then I read the liner notes to his 1974 album Planet Waves, where he wrote: “Duluth! Duluth — where Baudelaire Lived/& Goya cashed in his Chips, where Joshua brought/the house down!” These are not the words of someone who hates Duluth. These words lionize the city in terms of literature and mythology. A song on the album mentions Duluth too. From “Something There is About You“: “Thought I’d shaken the wonder/And the phantoms of my youth/Rainy days on the great lakes/Walkin’ the hills of old Duluth.” Duluth as a city of wonder and phantoms: who among us cannot relate?

Growing up in Hibbing, Dylan had family in Duluth and Superior. As a teen he went to Minneapolis more and more, and that became his jumping-off point to the world. But the Northland never left him. From his autobiography Chronicles, Volume One (2004 edition), one reads many references to Duluth, Hibbing, Minneapolis, and Minnesota as a whole.

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Music ,

Homegrown Music Festival 2024 Photo Slideshow

Paul Lundgren May 17, 2024 No Comments

This year was the third in row that I lugged my heavy camera around during the Homegrown Music Festival and attempted to be a photographer. Above are the 86 best photos I could muster.

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Photos, Videos