A novel set in a fictionalized Duluth/Superior

A colleague sent me a link to the novel False Negative by David B. Rusterholz, which is set in a fictional university in Superior/Duluth. The author lives in River Falls, a semi-rural, semi-suburb-of-the-Twin Cities community.

Has anyone read it?

Selective Focus: Murals and Art by Taylor Rose

Taylor Rose has attended more than 100 art festivals and his murals can be found spread out in the Duluth area, througuout the United States and in Brazil. Working with a variety of mediums, he has been creating pieces since he “was old enough to hold a pencil,” starting out by drawing Pokémon and cartoons in the flavor of Calvin and Hobbes. He can be reached at rose_oner98 @ gmail.com, with his art found at divergingrosedesigns.com, on Instgram at both @rose_oner and @divergingrose, and on TikTok @drosedesigns. Rose occasionally accepts commissions, continuously seeking to do work he finds “inspiring and lets me have creative freedom.” His clothing, prints, stickers, canvas and more can be found for sale on his website. Below are words from a recent interview with Rose and some of his work.

Summer Trips to the Northwest through Duluth, 1911

The Internet Archive hosts advertisements from transportation-themed magazines. This one features Duluth as the endpoint on a steamer trip to the Northwest, before joining the train to Seattle and points nearby in Canada and Oregon.

Bob Dylan’s Hibbing High School love letters sold for $670K

The Associated Press reports 42 handwritten love letters from Robert Zimmerman to his high school sweetheart, Barbara Ann Hewitt, were sold at auction to a Portuguese bookshop for nearly $670,000.

Jonathan Thunder on PBS

 

Duluth’s Jonathan Thunder is the subject of a new short film airing nationally on PBS. Jonathan Thunder: Good Mythology, directed by Sergio Mata’u Rapu, was selected by American Masters for national broadcast as part of the digital series In the Making. It will air in Duluth on WDSE-TV channel 8.1 on Tuesday, Nov. 22, following the broadcast of Buffy Sainte Marie: Carry it On. The programs occupy the 8 to 10 p.m. slot, so the Thunder feature will likely air after 9:30 p.m.

PDD Gift Guide 2022

Welcome to the 2022 PDD Holiday Gift Guide, highlighting products made in the Duluth area that one might wrap in paper and put under a tree. It features 15 items, as usual, but the comment area is open for limitless other suggestions. Or email the editors at info @ perfectduluthday.com.

Steamships from Buffalo to Duluth, 1901

This advert from Life magazine promotes trips from Buffalo through Chicago and Milwaukee to Duluth. I found it on the Internet Archive.

Lincoln Park Parking Park

In the category of “Best Name for a Parking Lot,” we have a winner.

Duluth’s Krummel family and their Maytag washing machine

Fifty years ago today Duluth’s Krummel family appeared in a Maytag washing machine advertisement. It was in the Nov. 17, 1972 issue of Life magazine.

Why Duluthians might be annoyed with Andrew Ti

For the second time in four months — and third time overall — Duluth has been mentioned on the podcast Yo, is this Racist? In the show’s opening banter, Andrew Ti mentions his fingers are cold. Co-host Tawny Newsome quickly points out how someone in Los Angeles complaining about cold fingers might be annoying to people in places like Buffalo, Fargo or Duluth.

Photos of an Empty Skywalk

The Duluth News Tribune recently published an article about the Downtown Task Force’s recommendations to improve conditions in downtown. This summer, I spent some time walking through the Skywalk system and was a bit shocked by how empty it was. The summer might not be the most popular time to use the Skywalk, but it wasn’t just the absence of people. So many of the shops that I remembered were gone. I didn’t intend to make a themed photo series about this, but I had my camera and kept turning a corner to find another impossibly long, completely empty hallway.

Duluth retailer on Twin Cities TV

Ryan Fleming of Rogue Robot Comics and Games was on KSTP-TV’s Minnesota Live with a nearly statewide audience, showing off hot holiday gift items and/or “a little bit of everything in geekdom.”

Climate>Duluth: Martha Stephens and Manlio Pertout of THES

Climate>Duluth host Tone Lanzillo interviews Martha Stephens and Manlio Pertout of the Human Exploring Society, which seeks to “talk to and involve everyone, because this connection we all share, plays the most important role in the changes we need to see.”

Abortion

This post originally featured a re-released classic from John Holden. The embedded video has since been removed from its source, YouTube.

All the hipsters in New York want to be from Duluth

This Twin Cities Public Television segment challenges the notion that Minnesotans are all blond-haired, blue-eyed Scandinavians. Although the piece is Twin Cities-focused, the final clip includes a nod to Duluth.