Paul Lundgren
Selective Focus: Homegrown 2023 Opening Ceremonies
Select Instagram images from opening day of the Homegrown Music Festival. (more…)
Homegrown Music Festival 2023 Primer
The 25th annual Homegrown Music Festival is upon us. All the specifics are in a 116-page Field Guide available around town or online as a PDF. The most accurate version of the schedule is always at duluthhomegrown.org/schedule. And this here primer consists of the random last-minute bulletins that always spring up. (more…)
Every Single Homegrown 1999 Photo Available
Members of Ballyhoo performing at the inaugural Homegrown Music Festival in 1999. (Photo courtesy Leon Rohrbaugh; photographer unknown)
On the eve of the 25th annual Homegrown Music Festival we take a look at every single locatable image from the first Homegrown in 1999. It was a few years before digital photography became a common thing, a few years before social media existed, and a few years before Homegrown became one of the most photographed events in Duluth. (more…)
Corner of the Lake, 1963
This photo by Lyman E. Nylander is dated April 28, 1963 — 60 years ago today. It shows several Canal Park icons — the Aerial Lift Bridge, Duluth Harbor North Breakwater Lighthouse, Uncle Harvey’s Mausoleum — but the Duluth Lakewalk is still decades away from being built.
Because of the I-35 tunnel, with Gichi-ode’ Akiing / Lake Place Park built on top of it, shooting a modern photo from this perspective would be either challenging or impossible.
Mystery Photo: Winding on the Hoist Motor, Duluth, 1908
This image is from a postcard mailed 115 years ago today — April 26, 1908. The writing on the front of the card appears to refer to it as a “new style winding on the hoist motor” in use in Duluth. Perhaps engine experts and handwriting analysts can help correct or affirm this phrase and provide some description of what it means. (more…)
Selective Focus: Snowy and Sloppy Spring PDDs
Select photos from Instagram spanning mid-March to mid-April 2023, all hashtagged with the name of a certain website. #perfectduluthday (more…)
Mystery Photo: Fire Department Captain
This mystery photo is another from the studio of the fiery ol’ Swede Lars Liden. Penned on the photo is something along the lines of “f. d. Capt. Axel Strom.”
It seems somewhat clear that the photo is of the captain of some fire department, and since the photo was shot in Duluth it is likely this captain represents Duluth or some municipality near Duluth. So, Axel Strom? Is that the name?
Postcard from West Duluth’s Riverview Motel
This undated postcard shows the Riverview Motel in West Duluth, which operated during the latter half of the 1900s and was replaced in the early 2000s by Westgate Townhomes. (more…)
Duluth & Iron Range No. 3 at Two Harbors circa the 1940s
Duluth & Iron Range Railroad locomotive No. 3, known as “Three Spot,” was built 140 years ago, in 1883, by Philadelphia-based Baldwin Locomotive Works. It has been on display at the D&IR Depot in Two Harbors since 1923 — a solid century. This photo is estimated to be from the 1940s. (more…)
Mystery Photo: Daughter of Duluth
There are times when Perfect Duluth Day’s Mystery Photo isn’t very mysterious. And this is one of those times. We know who is in the photo and much of her biography, but the photography studio is one we haven’t seen another image from. (more…)
Duluth’s beatnik coffee house had short life in 1960
Late in 1960, University of Minnesota Duluth student Bert Frink opened a beatnik coffee shop in Duluth called Bert’s Bit. It didn’t last long. (more…)
Postcard from a Section of the Duluth Harbor and Railroad Yards
This postcard, published by the Henricksen Agency of Duluth circa 1930, shows the Duluth waterfront, railroad yards and Aerial Lift Bridge.
Selective Focus: The Green Monster of March
Instagram is once again aglow with photos of the northern lights in and around Duluth. (more…)
Selective Focus: Wintery PDDs
Select photos from Instagram spanning mid-February to mid-March 2023, all hashtagged with the name of a certain website. #perfectduluthday (more…)
Mr. Bierhalter, what is bock beer?
As bock season kicks into high gear — Earth Rider celebrates this weekend; Fitger’s is waiting until April this year — we look back 110 years to get Fitger’s brewmaster John Bierhalter’s definition of the strong, dark beer traditionally brewed in fall and consumed in spring. (more…)
Mayor and Common Council, City of Duluth, March 10, 1913
Seated to the left of the mustached gentleman at far right appears to be Duluth’s 23rd mayor, Dr. John A. McCuen. Win the internet by identifying anyone else in the photo.
Postcard from Tugboats Record and Sinclair
Icebreaking in the Duluth Harbor is expected to start this week, with the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Spar clearing the way for the start of another shipping season.
The postcard above is from the early 1900s and shows the tugboats Record and Sinclair breaking ice in the Duluth Harbor. (more…)
AP Photo: Sixty-year-old plane crash near Duluth
March 3, 1963: Four Wisconsin men flying home from a fishing trip in Canada died as their small plane crashed in a field near Duluth. The plane, a Cessna 180, crashed at the edge of an open field a half mile west of Proctor and eight miles southwest of Duluth. (more…)
Duluth Book Releases in 2023
Complicated Warding
Michelle Matthees
Jan. 1
Press This!
Available at michellematthees.com
I Think I Know You
Julie Gard
Jan. 2
FutureCycle Press
Available at barnesandnoble.com
White Pine: The Natural and Human History of a Foundational American Tree
John Pastor
Jan. 5
Island Press
Available at islandpress.org
View of Duluth from Northern Pacific Docks circa 1880
This photograph shows a view of the Duluth hillside circa 1880. It was shot by Paul B. Gaylord from the Northern Pacific railroad dock. (more…)
Postcards from Sellers Mine, north of Hibbing
The Burt-Poole and Sellers mines were the first to ship iron ore out of Minnesota’s Iron Range in the summer of 1895. In its first five years the Sellers Ore Company shipped 188,000 tons. By 1919 the figure had shot up to 8.9 million tons, according to the 1921 book Duluth and St. Louis County, Minnesota; Their Story and People by Walter Van Brunt. (more…)
Selective Focus: Having an icy PDD
Select photos from Instagram spanning mid-January to mid-February 2023, all hashtagged with the name of a certain website. #perfectduluthday (more…)
Postcard from Elmgren Motor Court on North Shore Drive
This postcard, published by the Curt Teich Co. of Chicago, shows the Elmgren Motor Court in the tiny hamlet of Clifton, just outside Duluth’s city limits on the North Shore of Lake Superior. (more…)
Paddling the Pier
Photographer A. Hoppenyan of Noct Studium studio took this photo last night at sunset on Lake Superior next to the Duluth Shipping Canal. The identity of the person in the shot is unknown. Hoppenyan would like to get a print of the photo to the mystery paddle boarder, so give a shout if you can provide a clue.