Bagley Nature Area Population Boom?
It looks like there is a population explosion in UMD’s Bagley Nature Area! A couple elaborate shelters with exquisite details are inhabited — yet nicely hidden from the prying eyes of neighbors. At the time of my visit, the residents must have been in class but they did leave a fresh deer hide behind to greet me. I give them an A+ in civil engineering!
PDD Video Lab: “Windows” at the Tweed
Sharon Louden’s exhibition is on display at the Tweed Museum of Art through May 29.
Pick your favorite soundtrack from the choices below and play it along with this silent video.
Cornucopia 2015: A Remarkable Harvest!
A week ago we hosted an outstanding event at the Red Herring Lounge: Cornucopia 2015. The evening featured some of the best live music our area has to offer, both Emily Larson and Don Ness, live painting, tap dance, local brews, and more. Unbridled joy, like running with wild horses, marked the evening. A goal was to showcase and celebrate the abundant talent our area produced in 2015. This year’s harvest, if you will. Additionally, we wanted everyone to experience just how accessible these local “celebrities” really are. There are no little people. You can read more about this one-of-a-kind evening, the busiest Tuesday ever at the Red Herring Lounge, at Ed’s Big Adventure.
College of St. Scholastica 2015 Christmas Video
Sledding, sweets and a warm fire. All the good stuff.
Red Fox near Duluth Harbor
Rich Hoeg was out looking for snowy owls on the Duluth waterfront and came up empty … except for this red fox sighting. For more photos check out Hoeg’s 365 Days of Birds blog.
Nathan Gustavsson of Hermantown
Since the shooting in the Twin Cities at the Black Lives Matter protest, it was revealed that one of the suspects is from Hermantown.
Nearly 1,000 people marched to City Hall on Tuesday, less than a day after five protesters were shot near a Black Lives Matter demonstration, an apparently racially motivated attack that pushed Minneapolis into the national spotlight.
Minneapolis police said Tuesday that they have arrested three men in connection with the shooting. Allen Lawrence “Lance” Scarsella III, 23, was arrested in Bloomington. Sources said Nathan Gustavsson, 21, of Hermantown, and Daniel Macey, 26, of Pine City, were taken into custody after they turned themselves in. All three suspects are white. Earlier Tuesday, police arrested a 32-year-old Hispanic man in south Minneapolis, but he was later released because, police said, he was not at the scene of the shooting.
—Minneapolis Star Tribune: 3 men in custody, 1 released in Minneapolis 4th Precinct protest shooting
A friend of mine in the Cities wanted to know how that revelation played out up here. To be honest, his question was the first I’d heard.
Thoughts?
This Week: lots o’ music, whiskey, comedy and more
Here’s a bit of what you’ll find on this week’s PDD Calendar:
Rockapella 2015 is in the house: Home Free stops at the DECC for some vocal-only action, people can taste a bunch of whiskeys at the Kitch to benefit the DSSO, Superior Siren plays the Red Herring with Coyote and Black Diary, Mary Poppins flies into Duluth, pop-country guy Chris Young comes to the Amsoil and Chris Monroe shows her latest stuff.
Kate Isles releases her first solo album, Rubber Chicken presents its latest Duluth-centric holiday production, Mozart’s opera The Magic Flute comes to Weber Music Hall, Charles Dickens serves up some ghostly justice to the ultimate one-percenter, a bunch of bands comprised of people who didn’t ask to be stuck together perform and Sacred Heart is holding a holiday fundraiser.
Bald eagle stuck in trap rescued by hunters
Two brothers grouse hunting in Canada rescued a bald eagle with its talon stuck in a trap and then took a selfie with it. They posted video of the rescue on Facebook, the freeing of the talon took about four minutes. (more…)
Video Archive: Fromunda Trio at R.T. Quinlan’s
The trio of Tina Ludwig-Laxen, Jay Johnson and James J. Myers Jr. performing at R.T. Quinlan’s Saloon during an open mic on Sept. 16, 1995.
Elvis – A Day in Duluth
A previous post on Perfect Duluth Day reveals a Led Zeppelin bootleg from the 1960s is incorrectly labeled as “Live in Duluth.” Well, it turns out there is an Elvis Presley album titled A Day in Duluth that has every indication of being authentic. (more…)
Duluth musician has fortuitous random connection in Norway
Via Vestnytt, a newspaper published in Straume, Norway, PDD reports: “Det magiske Kallestadmøtet i luften.”
Duluth musician Jamie Kallestad performed at the the Glesvær Kafe yesterday. Translators, sort that out and share your wisdom.
Kristy Marie and the Forget Me Nots Indiegogo Campaign
Duluth band Kristy Marie and the Forget Me Nots is working on a new album of “ethereal folk music” titled Maiden America. Contributions are being sought through an Indiegogo campaign to acquire a “mastering ear contributing to the completion of the sound” and to pay CD-printing costs.
Selective Focus: Editor’s Choice
One year of Selective Focus would be impossible to capture in a single post, so I’ve gleaned just a few personal favorites. I think we’ve accomplished together many of my initial desires to foreground the real people who live work and play here, and to build community through art, no matter how homely or grand. (more…)
Sulfide Mining Debate + The Holidays = Watch This
Surely sulfide mining is close to the top of the things Minnesotans can disagree about with family and friends as we enter the holidaze. This two-minute video depicts one way the outcome of the PolyMet question could play out. Great for captive audiences who are too stuffed to resist. Enjoy!
Duluth City Council votes to oppose Trans Pacific Partnership
Thanks to the Duluth City Council for voting 8 to 1 to oppose the Trans Pacific Partnership. The DNT article is here.
The TPP has been negotiated in secret for years, and has been called “NAFTA on steroids” and a “corporate coup d’ etat.” If you’ve never heard of it that’s no coincidence. It will offshore jobs, raise the price of medicines, threaten net neutrality, threaten environmental protections, undermine human rights, roll back Wall Street reforms, and perhaps most frighteningly of all it will establish unelected tribunals whose courts will take precedence over U.S. and other national court systems with regard to trade disputes. Laws passed by democracies will no longer be the law of the land. This is an assault on our republican form of government. Please read more about it here and here.
Please email Senator Al Franken and Senator Amy Kobuchar.
Mayor Ness profiled on MinnPost
“Don Ness doesn’t want to be America’s most popular mayor anymore,” reads the headline of a feature on the Minneapolis-based nonprofit news website MinnPost. “Ness, at 41, is doing what is inconceivable to some: stepping away from politics indefinitely at the height of his career — a move that has left many in Duluth and around the state wondering: Why?”
On Twitter, Ness offers an alternate title for the story:
Twin Ports Joyride: Reduced-cost taxicab rides on the west side
A program designed to provide $7 taxicab vouchers to tipsy bar patrons in western Duluth and Proctor has been ramping up exposure leading into the holidays. Twin Ports Joyride is funded by participating bars, beer wholesalers and other donations. (more…)
Led Zeppelin Live in Duluth | Oct. 19, 1968
Don’t let the “Minnesota Blues” or the “Live in Duluth” on this album cover fool you, Led Zeppelin never performed in Duluth. But what is the story behind this Zep bootleg? (more…)
This Week: turkey time, Small Business Saturday, rooms that need escaping and more
Here’s a bit of what you’ll find on this week’s PDD Calendar:
It’s Thanksgiving week, so of course there’s a lot of turkey business going on in addition to the usual tomfoolery. Minnesota Congressman Rick Nolan comes to town on Monday for a forum, tap dancers, mayors and musicians come together in what’s being called a “lavish feast of local talent,” a locally-made Christmas coffee-table book is released, a man who spent two decades in prison speaks and comedian Josh Blue performs in Canal Park.
The Twin Ports Thanksgiving Buffet takes place, there’s a Thanksgiving Day Walk/Run in Lake Nebagamon, self-guided Christmas tours get underway at Glensheen Mansion, there’s a Funked-Up Dance Party at R.T. Quinlan’s, UMD Women’s Hockey gets discounted, Small Business Saturday is in effect with a multi-entrepreneur pop-up shop and the Northland’s first live-action-adventure escape room opens.
Video Archive: Deer hunters outside Chet & Emil’s
This film, circa 1975, was shot by the late Emil Praslowicz in Birnamwood, Wis., and digitized by his grandson, Kip Praslowicz.