December 2019 Posts

Climate>Duluth: Alice Tibbetts

Host Tone Lanzillo interviews Alice Tibbetts of We Walk in Duluth. This is show #3 in the Climate>Duluth series recorded at Duluth Public Access Community Television’s studio in City Hall.

Acceptance Speech, Mayor of Snow-Fort City

Thank you, distinguished citizens, for conferring upon me this office of Snow-Fort City Mayor. It is no small honor to assume my half-imaginary duties in this pop-up, collaborative, city-planning art fantasy at the edge of Lake Superior. “City” is an aspirational term for this arrangement of snow walls and monuments in Duluth’s Leif Erickson Park. Snow-Fort City’s true location lies somewhere within our skulls — like all cities. My Facebook post initiating construction was shared more than a hundred times in just a few hours, and it attracted the Duluth News-Tribune and KBJR-6/CBS-3, which tells me the vision of the snow-fort city is the real object. Almost none of the post-sharers, newspaper readers, or TV viewers made it down to the actual Snow-Fort City. They are content to view it with their eyes closed, in its most pure form: the Platonic one.

It literally came to me in a vision, like the origin of so many great cities. In a way, like Duluth itself. I remember the words of George Nettleton’s wife from 1856, when her husband’s mind swam with dreams of Duluth-as-future-city: “I thought he had a pretty long head to see that there was going to be a city here sometime when there was then nothing” (Duluth: An Illustrated History of the Zenith City by Glenn N. Sandvik).

Free Air Life Co. brings outdoor apparel to Lincoln Park

Free Air Life retail store marketing director Katy Rochel and co-owner Sarah Steinbach stand in front of apparel at the new Lincoln Park shop.

Another new business has opened in a revitalized Duluth building positioned to add more retail shopping to the Lincoln Park Craft District.

Selective Focus: Pups

A gallery of faithful four-legged friends.

Postcard from Tri-Tower Apartments

This postcard from Gallagher’s Studio of Photography offers a 1970’s-era view of Tri-Tower Apartments at 220-226 N. Second Ave. E. in Duluth’s Central Hillside. The 15-story lobes were constructed in 1972 and are operated by the Housing and Redevelopment Authority of Duluth, providing low-rent living space for elderly people with limited incomes.

Climate>Duluth: Izzy Laderman

Host Tone Lanzillo interviews climate activist Izzy Laderman. This is show #4 in the Climate>Duluth series recorded at Duluth Public Access Community Television’s studio in City Hall.

Petitioning to Change Duluth in 2019

From successful to silly, and potentially both, Duluthians remain as active as ever on the petition website change.org. Not that fewer than a dozen petitions per year is technically active, but it is as active as ever.

As is generally the case, a petition pertaining to the local colleges was the most popular, but with an asterisk. A statewide petition that relates to Duluth deserves equal mention.

The Slice: Historic Hibbing Pipe Organ

Victoria Lundberg Gornick shows off the 1,900+ pipe Barton organ in Hibbing High School’s auditorium.

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.

Bankruptcy in the West End and the Horse You Rode in On

Here’s a little something for bankruptcy law nerds and fans of commerce in western Duluth circa the early 1980s. One would pretty much have to be fanatical about both to read through the full document linked here …

United States Bankruptcy Court, D. Minnesota, Fifth Division
Jun 7, 1985
52 B.R. 501 (Bankr. D. Minn. 1985)

… but perhaps the summary below will suffice for the average Duluthian.

Duluth Trivia Deck Sampler #31

Another trivia card from a board game purchased at Savers.

Snow-Fort City, Day 8


 

I am running for Mayor of #snowfortcity.

Journalism to break my heart

John Ramos changes my heart and my mind in nearly every post on the Duluth Monitor.

Superior Siren – “Last Christmas”

Duluth’s Superior Siren perform “Last Christmas” by Wham. Video by Michelle Bennett

Moms & Dads Today, Duluth.com magazines fold

A pair of Duluth publications reached the end of their roads earlier this year. Moms & Dads Today and Duluth.com magazines have been absent from shelves since the July/August issues.

Michael Fedo signs at Zenith Bookstore

I was lucky enough to run into Michael Fedo at Zenith Bookstore at the rescheduled Small Business Saturday on Dec. 7. How did you spend the rescheduled Small Business Saturday last weekend?