Postcards from Silver Creek Cliff
Before the Silver Creek Cliff Tunnel was built in the early 1990s, Highway 61 wound around the edge of the cliff. Drivers relied on skill and luck to avoid tumbling boulders or anything that might send them plunging over the edge into Lake Superior. The Gitchi-Gami State Trail was later built following the old Highway 61 path.
The card shown up top was mailed to Austria, so good luck translating the message on the back.
It seems worthy of pointing out that the fellow who sent the third card in this series was hoping to build a porch, but didn’t want to work in the rain. “So will have to play ping pong on my ding dong until it clears,” he notes.
When home for Christmas we watched some newly transferred to DVD home movies from my grandparents, which included a drive through Duluth up the north shore. It was very cool to see what it looked like before the tunnels!
I’ll always fondly remember the multiple near-death encounters with cars as I rode my bike along the Silver Cliff portion of 61 headed to Gooseberry Falls.
I will never go through that tunnel without thinking about the stories my father-in-law tells about having to navigate that road during snowstorms etc, coming home from Reserve Mining after his swing shifts. He had a friend die from going off that cliff on one of those carpooling trips.