College Ranker has sorted the nation’s college towns based on how “things like community, neighborhoods, schools” and other aspects create a place that is “attractive in retaining students who graduate from local colleges.” Duluth came in at #22. For some reason, UMD is the only one of the handful of colleges in the area that receives a mention in the text.
Courtland Powe, owner of the Duluth ice cream truck and cruisin’ kitchen called the King of Creams, has announced a restaurant of the same name will open in the Central Hillside at 502 E. Fourth St. this Saturday, March 14. The storefront had previously served as a Quiznos sandwich shop, and is better known as one of Duluth’s four former Jim’s Hamburgers locations. The new fast-casual restaurant will feature a menu that includes cheese-steak sandwiches, burgers, deep-fried pickles, malts and hand-scooped ice cream. Grand opening events will be held March 14 and 15, with all menu items at half price. Regular hours will be 10:30 a.m. to 7 p.m., seven days a week.
Tycoons Alehouse is in PreservationNation’s online competition to determine America’s favorite historic watering hole. The Historic Bars Tournament has tapped 32 historic drinkeries to compete against one another in an NCAA Tournament-style, single-elimination format. Each week the blog will serve another round of pairings where readers will vote for their favorite inns and alehouses. When the matchups run dry on April 3, only one bar will claim the top shelf. Voting for each round will last one week and close every Friday morning at 7 a.m. Once each round is complete, the bracket will be updated with vote counts and winners.
The Duluth News Tribune reported on Monday that Sumlee Beede is moving her Sala Thai restaurant from Woodland Avenue to Downtown Duluth. “Beede is buying the two-story brick building at 114 W. First St. where she started in the restaurant business in 1999,” the story notes. “That year, she opened Thai Krathong, which developed a loyal following for its authentic Thai food. After she sold the business, it moved to Canal Park and closed in 2013.” The move would displace the Giant Panda restaurant, and could result in legal action to execute the eviction. According to the DNT, a court hearing on the matter is scheduled for next week. Sala Thai is Duluth’s only Thai restaurant. Beede plans to close the Woodland location on March 26 and open the downtown location in April.
The March 9 issue of New Yorker includes a lengthy article titled “Break-in at Y-12,” which tells the story (with much digression) of Duluth’s Gregory Boertje-Obed and his role in the July 2012 break-in at the Y-12 nuclear weapons facility in Oak Ridge, Tenn.
Boertje-Obed, along with fellow Catholic Worker Movement activists Megan Gillespie Rice and former Duluthian Michael Walli, cut fences to enter the facility and spray-painted messages, poured blood and ceremonially chipped away at the foundation of a building that houses one of the largest stores of bomb-grade uranium in the world.
Duluth had another dateline in the Onion last week:
Long-silent Facebook friend comes out of woodwork with post asking about insulating windows
The March issue of Details magazine ranks American-made gins in an article titled “The American Gin Renaissance.” Duluth’s Vikre Distillery took fourth place for its Boreal Cedar Gin.
4. Vikre Distillery Boreal Cedar Gin
Duluth, Minnesota
The Gin: Smoky, thanks to red cedar.
Fun Fact: “I developed the Cedar specifically to make my perfect Negroni,” says cofounder Emily Vikre.
The Appeal: For fermentation and proofing, Vikre uses purified Lake Superior water, which is soft and devoid of (taste-altering) minerals. $30
There’s an online version of the article with the more click-baitish title, “10 American-made gins that are too damn good to pass up.”
Another recent honor: Vikre’s Ovrevann Aquavit won a bronze medal in the DSS category at the American Craft Spirits Association’s Distillers Convention & Vender Trade Show in mid-February. (Through exhaustive research — you know, like ten minutes worth — PDD is now able to update this report to clarify that DSS stands for Distilled Spirits, Specialty.)
The Duluth Transit Authority has been awarded a $6.3-million grant to purchase six electric buses and a fast-charge station. Duluth was considered an excellent test location for the development of electric vehicle technology because of its challenging cold weather and steep terrain.
The grant comes from the Federal Transit Administration‘s Low or No Emission Vehicle Deployment Program; the buses and charging station will come from Proterra, a South Carolina company that designs and manufactures zero-emission electric transit vehicles and systems.
The DTA was one of 10 grant applicants that will receive funding. A $1.1-million local share will bring the total project cost to $7.5 million.
The buses and charging station are expected to be available in 2016 and will be integrated into the DTA’s new Multimodal Transportation Center, which is under construction at Michigan Street and Third Avenue West and scheduled to open before the end of 2015.
In other transit news …
With 4,106 of 4,106 precincts reporting statewide, the full results are in. Listed are the races relevant to Duluth.
David Orman announced this morning that his promotional products business, Raven & Associates, will close at the end of July. Orman founded the company in 1997 and changed locations a handful of times before landing in the old West Theater building in 2012.
“We are in a low margin, high touch industry,” Orman wrote to customers today. “As busy as we were, it was really hard to make money.”
Meanwhile, the West Duluth Business Club announced there will be a new farmers market in West Duluth on the lot of the former Westminster Church. Beginning this week it will operate every Thursday into October, from 3 to 7 p.m., on the corner of 45th Avenue West and Grand Avenue.
“In the beginning it will host between 6 and 10 vendors,” West Duluth Business Club President Charlie Stauduhar wrote to club members. “Please, if you can, show up on Thursday and thank the vendors with your support.”
Endion Station Public House is opening July 25. It will serve pulled-meat sandwiches and Brewhouse beer in the historic train depot on the Lakewalk, and there are plans for live music on the patio.
Available now for free download on Bandcamp, 106 megabytes of rawk and/or roll selected by Duluth soundman extraordinaire Eric Swanson, brought to you by the Homegrown Music Festival.
Photo via Fox 21 News
At about 8:15 p.m. the front awning of the Greysolon Plaza collapsed, presumably from the weight of snow. There are no reports of injuries.
In the article “A New Type of Growing City,” The Atlantic quotes “the mayor of a city that has similarities to Sioux Falls and Burlington” who “sent this extremely interesting note.”
Who could that have been?
I was particularly interested in your recent story about Burlington. I believe there is a new class of city emerging across the country which are positioned to succeed in the coming decade – a class of city that has not yet been identified on a national scale.
This city is a small/mid-sized regional center. The population range I have been studying are cites between 50-125k. These cities are defined by natural beauty, outdoor recreation, strong and supportive arts community, entrepreneurial spirit, progressive outlook, and a strong sense of place and ethos connected to the place people choose to live. Cities like Burlington, Asheville, Flagstaff, Bend, Missoula, Santa Fe, Provo, and Duluth.
These cities are all at least a couple hours outside of the major metro in their area, which affords them their own character and identity. They are popular destinations for the metro – primarily tourism, but increasingly companies are coming to realize they can locate in these small cities and find the talent they need to find. Because this is where the talent wants to live.
Related to Minnesota Woolen Mills posts on Perfect Duluth Day is this December 1978 Corporate Report article.
Jerry Polinsky Tries His Luck in Atlantic City
Considered ‘insolvent’ in Duluth, the former Minnesota Woolens executive is laying heavy bets along the Boardwalk …
By Charles I. Mundale
In early summer 1977, a new hotel corporation was formed in Atlantic City, N.J.
In late summer 1977, an old retailing company bellied up in Duluth, Minn.
