Month: April 2019
The Saturday Evening Post’s Duluth of 1949
Seventy years ago — April 16, 1949 — Duluth was featured in The Saturday Evening Post as part of the magazine’s series on “America’s most colorful cities.” The lengthy article by Arthur W. Baum was the 65th in the series, and features photographs by Frank Ross.
The intro text reads: “Once a bleakly unpromising village, this now great grain and ore center has survived many a stunning setback — thereby making her smart-aleck detractors look foolish. The cheif hazard of life here is this: You never know when a wild bear will drop in for breakfast.”
(more…)New York Times looks at Duluth as climate-change refuge
“As the West burns, the South swelters and the East floods, some Americans are starting to reconsider where they choose to live,” writes New York Times climate reporter Kendra Pierre-Louis in an article suggesting people might someday migrate to Duluth to escape global warming. (more…)
Woodchucc Szn
John Degelau sends one out to the woodchucks in this 2018/’19 video of ski stunts.
Jack Schmid, Peter Lochner, Gordon Buffington, Kendozer, Ben Thelen, Garret Schwindt, Mitchell Kasper, and Dylan O’Connor are credited for shooting the clips.
Duluth Band Profile: MRS. & the Sordid Affairs
Moriah Skye of MRS. & the Sordid Affairs explains the backstory behind Thick. She opens up about the challenges of being a transgender musician in contemporary society. Click on the image above to hear the podcast.
Upcoming gig:
May 3 at Pizza Lucé during Homegrown Music Festival
PDD Quiz: Homegrown Innovations Edition
In honor of the upcoming Homegrown Music Festival, this PDD quiz examines inventions, innovations, and ideas that were “homegrown” in the Duluth area.
The next PDD quiz will review headlines from April 2019 and will be published on April 28. Please email question suggestions to Alison Moffat at [email protected] by April 25. (more…)
Selective Focus: 2019 Frozen Four Champion UMD Bulldogs
https://www.instagram.com/p/BwN-Bs9nzxs/
Instagram images related to the UMD Bulldogs 2019 Frozen Four championship. (more…)
Ripped at Score Sports Bar & Grill in 2009
[Editor’s note: For this week’s essay we’ve once again pulled out a relic from the archive of Slim Goodbuzz, who served as Duluth’s “booze connoisseur” from 1999 to 2009. Few people will remember Score Sports Bar & Grill; it existed for a brief period spanning 2008 and 2009 at 21 N. Fourth Ave. W. in Downtown Duluth. The location is best known for Duluth Athletic Club Bar & Grill, but six different bar/restaurants occupied the space during a 15-year span at the turn of the millennium. Ol’ Slim paid a visit in April 2009 to file this report for the weekly Transistor.]
Considering the proximity to Duluth Police headquarters, not to mention the cops actually working right inside the door, it’s a bit surprising to see the sidewalk outside Score Bar slippery with a fine, fresh spray of urine, and littered with an array of beer cans. Then again, I’d bet that none of the kids sucking on Michelob Golden Light inside the place are attending the University of Minnesota Duluth on a scholarship.
And sure enough, as I walk in the door, some sorry tyke is leaning against the wall and mopping tears from his cheeks as one of Duluth’s finest writes him up. The crime undoubtedly has something to do with pulling out his trouser snake right there on Fourth Avenue West, which will be his claim to fame in the newspaper’s “Matters of Record” column, his greatest achievement before flunking out of business school, hopping into the 2009 Chevy Silverado his proud parents bought for him and driving back to Anoka or wherever the fuck sorry losers like this spring from. (more…)
Duluth Homegrown on Rockin’ the Suburbs podcast
https://embeds.audioboom.com/posts/7226155-rarities-bob-mould-paul-westerberg/embed/v4?eid=AQAAAEinrFwrQ24A
Duluth’s Homegrown Music Festival gets five minutes of attention on Rockin’ the Suburbs, a “podcast dedicated to exploring all forms of rock and pop music, from the perspective of two music-crazed suburbanites, Jim Lenahan and Patrick Foster.” (more…)
The Slice: Quiltfire
Scott “Starfire” Lunt’s quilt show is on display in the Kruk Gallery at the University of Wisconsin-Superior until the end of April.
In its series The Slice, WDSE-TV 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.
Duluth Band Profile: Moon Dogs
Members of Moon Dogs expand into new creative territory on Ghost. The band reflects on the challenge of complete creative control. Click on the image above to hear the podcast.
Upcoming gig:
May 4 at R.T. Quinlan’s Saloon during Homegrown Music Festival
UMD All Hockey Pep Band Hair Team
Check out the “Perfect Duluth Hay.” Go Dogs!
From Jinny Moe’s photography collection
Virginia “Jinny” Moe of Duluth donated this work to the the Metropolitan Museum of Art: Boy and Girl Holding Hands, ca. 1850, by Bennet. (more…)
The Symptones – “Rosetta”
The Symptones, a five-piece rock, soul, punk and folk-influenced band from Minneapolis, was in Duluth for a pair of gigs last month. The group’s first video, directed by Steven George, features some Duluthy scenes.
The song “Rosetta” is from the band’s upcoming album Irrational Fears / Overactive Imagination, due out April 26.
Worden Day in Metropolitan Museum, via Julie Nunull Marshall
Another item at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is this item donated by Julie Nunull Marshall of Duluth. (I can’t find any records about her easily, beyond the record of generosity and taste.)
In the 1970s she donated Arcana II, 1969, by Worden Day to the Metropolitan.
Worden Day is now deceased, but immortalized by the generosity of a Duluthian.
Aunt with eventful romantic life lands Duluth in Onion again
Duluth is once again in the dateline of a story on the satirical news website The Onion. According to the article, nephews and nieces of Janine Harrison have confirmed she “managed to somehow both marry and divorce two separate times since the last time they had seen her.”
It’s the 15th time Duluth has been the location of an Onion story, by Perfect Duluth Day’s count. Just 33 days ago Moose Lake was featured.
Martha’s Daughter restaurant has closed, business will continue as popup
Photo by Wolfskull Creative
On the same day reconstruction of East Superior Street begins in Duluth, the strip’s hottest new restaurant has announced its run is over. After a little more than a year in business as a brick-and-mortar establishment, Martha’s Daughter is reverting to popup status. (more…)
Winifred E. Higgins in the Metropolitan Museum of Art
A huge collection of world art is available online at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This “charger” (which won’t do anything for my cell phone) was owned by Winifred E. Higgins, who lived at 2401 E. Second St. in Duluth.
The charger was manufactured by the Kalo Shops, which Wikipedia calls “the leading maker of Arts and Crafts movement silver in Chicago.”
(I didn’t know either — a “charger” is a plate that sits under the other plates. Your server places your salad plate atop your charger, then your soup bowl atop your charger, then your dinner plate atop your charger, before the charger is removed for dessert.)
Duluth Band Profile: Nudecolors
Nudecolors uses tight harmonies with catchy melodies on Paradise. Yet, Steve Hamlin and Nic Hanson explain the deceptive nature of the record. Click on the image above to hear the podcast.
Upcoming gig:
May 3 at Rex Bar at Fitger’s during Homegrown Music Festival
Duluth Flag Redesign Project
The city of Duluth is holding an initiative to redesign the city flag. All members of the public are encouraged to participate regardless of skill. The purpose of the project is to create a new symbol that all Duluthians can identify with. Submit ideas for the flag contest before Friday, April 12, at 5 p.m.
Gaelynn Lea – “Breathe, You are Alive!”
This is the official music video for Gaelynn Lea‘s original poem, “Breathe, You are Alive!” from her 2016 EP The Songs We Sing Along the Way. The video was shot in 2018 and was released earlier this week.
First Tick of the Year: 2019 Edition
It’s a bit of a tradition on Perfect Duluth Day to note the discovery of the first tick of the season. PDD’s tech director, Cory Fechner, supplied the video above of a wood tick he discovered today in far western Minnesota. We should be hearing soon about the first Duluth tick of the season.
Some years they show up as early as March. And sometimes they stick around into October. Mostly it’s a May/June problem.
U.S. Administrator of Standards
The middle of Donald Trump’s presidency might be a strange time to make a pitch for establishing a new cabinet position. Or it might be the perfect time. Either way, I have little to lose by suggesting the new job is needed and insisting I’m the best person to fill it. A more rational and reputation-conscious president might not give my ideas serious consideration. The Trump Administration is likely the best hope I have for acquiring short-term autocratic power.
I’m not interested in any of the existing cabinet positions. Those jobs are pretty much filled anyway, although some are “acting” cabinet members — and it’s understood the door is figuratively revolving at the White House and heavily treated with WD-40.
The various secretaries, directors, ambassadors and administrators who serve at the pleasure of the president are already busy at work to make America as great as it was at some undefined point in the past, and they aren’t really clamouring for my help, but I do have a few simple ideas that could improve America and the whole planet Earth for that matter, and I feel like it would really only take me until noon on my first day at work to sort those things out. That would leave plenty of time for cleaning out my already empty desk after hearing on the news about the tweet announcing the termination of my employment. (more…)