Leaving Duluth: Feel free to write your own caption

Leaving Duluth postcard image circa 1910

“Leaving Duluth” postcard image from Arcade studio, roughly a century ago.

5 Comments

Endion

about 9 years ago

Well this was an oddly painted background for a picture studio, but I guess when you have so many people leaving Duluth you need a backdrop like this.

See ya - wouldn't want to be ya!

Paul Lundgren

about 9 years ago

At the time of the photo Duluth's population was still climbing. Duluth gained 20,000 people between 1910 and 1920. It was the fourth decade in a row the city's population rose at a level that could be measured in the tens of thousands, but it was also the last. 

In the past century there was a slow population climb, then a somewhat rapid decline and a  long period of leveling off -- so right now we sit at roughly the same 86,000 that were here when the photo was shot.

Obviously the population drop that happened from the 1960s to the 1990s -- along with the struggles of a cold, snowless winter -- leaves a lot of Duluthians inclined to get a laugh out of the notion of a woman "leaving Duluth" and perhaps saying "good riddance." 

When I look at her, I see she is reluctant to leave. She had a good time on her visit to Duluth. Perhaps there was some romance. Maybe she'll come back some day. But for now she'll just send this postcard home so her friends and family don't worry.

In the interest of comedic pessimism, however, I'll suggest she lived here for 20 years and finally decided she was unhappy with the quality of burritos and needed to head south.

Ramos

about 9 years ago

She's trying to remember: "Did I turn off the lights?"

Niff Bimrod

about 9 years ago

"Too many fuckin hipsters here, I'm going north...to find a real man."

marko3133

about 9 years ago

Why that looks like Katie Holstrom ready to leave for D.C. to work for Congressman Morley ("Yah, Mr. Morley").

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