October 2019 Posts

Video Archive: WDIO-TV Halloween Weather Report

From the haunted film vault comes this 1970s clip featuring WDIO-TV weatherman Jack McKenna, two mice and Dracula. Also featured at the end are anchorman Dennis Anderson and sportscaster Bill Stefl.

Happy Halloween!

Zombie self defense at UMD

What better place to find big juicy brains to feast on than an institute of higher learning. UMD Chief Information Officer, Jason Davis, explains how to defend against a zombie attack using principles of Jujutsu.

The Slice: Haunted Ridge

The Haunted Shack has been bringing the scare to northern Minnesota for 26 years. The year’s spookenings are at Ru-Ridge Corn Maze in Carlton, about 10 miles southwestish of Duluth.

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.

Countdown to Halloween: Duluth Paranormal Society

The Duluth Paranormal Society has been featured in the Duluth News Tribune. Most interesting is its research into Sir Benedict’s Tavern on the Lake.

The DNT article includes links to other resources:

Minnesota Paranormal Study Group

Iron Range Paranormal Research

Happy Halloween. 🙂

Halloween Banners

ZombieBanner-Call

Got a great costume this year, or been to a good Halloween party already? We want to see your creepy, comical, kooky Halloween photos. And we’d love to add them to the banner rotation — the long skinny photos at the top of the page when you view Perfect Duluth Day on a desktop computer. (There are no photo banners if you are on a smartphone.)

Keep in mind, the proportions are extremely horizontal, so not every photo works when cropped. Click here for complete submission guidelines, but the basics are: 1135 pixels wide by 197 pixels high, e-mail them to [email protected].

If you’re not able to crop and size them, send the full image and we’ll do our best to crop it into a banner.

Postcards from the Buena Vista Motel

This postcard of the Buena Vista Motel was published by Gallagher’s Studio of Photography and appears to be circa the early 1970s.

R.I.P. Xavier Bell, Family Freedom Center founder

A celebration of Xavier Bell’s life will be held on Saturday, Nov. 2, 3 p.m., at Peace United Church of Christ. Visitation is at 2 p.m. All are welcome.

Countdown to Halloween: Nopeming

Nopeming has a special place in the paranormal of Duluth. The Travel Channel sent a team in 2015, as featured in the link above. The Duluth News Tribune covered its history in a 2017 article.

The Nopeming facility was in use until Nov. 25, 2002. Friends of mine have laughed that rooms and spaces shown on ghost hunting shows holding tormented souls were, in fact, the places they worked as food service workers in high school.

Duluth Trivia Deck Sampler #26

Another trivia card from a board game purchased at Savers.

Countdown to Halloween: Twin Ports Paranormal Society

The Twin Ports Paranormal Society will “investigate the paranormal for people in need of help at no charge. Confidentiality will be respected.”

Atmosphere – “Say Shh …”

Minneapolis-based hip-hop outfit Atmosphere name-drops Duluth in a hidden track on its 2003 studio album Seven’s Travels.

Countdown to Halloween: Lady Ocalat’s Paranormal Investigations

I’ve been to Lady Ocalat’s Emporium once, to buy some fake dove blood for purposes of writing with my new fountain pen. I don’t know entirely the relationship between the tarot reading services and the paranormal investigations, but Lady Ocalat’s website maintains a record of past paranormal activity, bigfoot sightings and UFO sightings.

PDD Quiz: October 2019 in Review

Another month of 2019 has nearly passed; how much of it do you remember? Take this quiz to test your knowledge of local headlines.

The next PDD quiz, on statues of people, will be published on Nov. 10. Submit question suggestions to Alison Moffat at [email protected] by Nov. 7.

Two Harbors Carmody 61 closed until further notice

The bar/restaurant once operated by Rick Boo, Carmody 61 in Two Harbors, closed this week for unspecified reasons. Boo died at age 60 in August and was also part of the management at Carmody Irish Pub and Brewing in Duluth.

Both Carmody establishments have been on and off recent lists from the Minnesota Department of Revenue for delinquent payment of taxes.

Ed Gleeson, a partner in the enterprises, said he is “duty bound” to not comment until Boo’s estate has been probated.

“That’s for the family’s sake,” he said.

Countdown to Halloween: International Paranormal Society

Gloria Doescher (left) shows Chris Julien (center) and Adrian Lee a photo of what her thermal imaging camera picked up during one of the vigils at Fairlawn Mansion and Museum in Superior. The three investigated the mansion along with other members of the International Paranormal Society, the first time in more than a dozen years that ghost hunters were allowed into the mansion. (Maria Lockwood / Superior Telegram)

The International Paranormal Society has visited Duluth multiple times. One of its visits included time on the SS William A. Irvin, another the mansion at Fairlawn. Adrian Lee, its founder, has a pretty unique gimmick — he talks about working at the intersection of history and paranormal science, spending time in archives to track historical records that help him make sense of the data his heat sensors and ghost boxes find. Triangulation yields truth, apparently.