Video Archive: Mel Sando gets his mojo working

Mel Sando, best known for his days with the Delta Resonators circa 1997-1999, performs the blues classic “Got My Mojo Working” at R.T. Quinlan’s Saloon during an open mic on Sept. 16, 1995.

Music, VideosR.T. Quinlan's Saloon, Video Archive

How to see Duluth and Superior on electric cars

How to see Duluth and Superior

The date on this bad boy is 1909. The cover image seems to suggest there was a floating railway perpendicular to the shipping canal where people could watch flaming ships torch the city. (more…)

HistoryTransportation
Ashwabay Alliance / Big Top Chautauqua

Cloud Cult – “No Hell” (Homemade Lyric Video)

“No Hell” is the first single from Cloud Cult’s forthcoming album The Seeker, scheduled for release in February. The official music video will be released in December. For now, the band put together this “quick homemade behind-the-scenes lyric video, shot lo-fi on a phone” in the “woods where most of these songs are written.”

Music, VideosCloud Cult

Selective Focus: Black and White

Brian Barber

Brian Barber, “Bandit”

Black and white photography is most often anything but. Degrees of tone exist in a broad spectrum within what we reductively deem either/or. I’ve argued before that its use as an aesthetic device is antiquarian, retrogressive- that the medium has grown past the limitation, yet there remains an appeal in seeing images pared to their essence, without the ersatz mediation of hdr and hyper-saturation. (more…)

Art, PhotosSelective Focus
Pier B Resort: Rise and Dine

Looking for local authors

The Duluth Public Library is looking for local authors for Author Day on Nov. 21. In order to participate, an author must have published at least one book and have copies of the book(s) available for sale. (Self-publishing qualifies.) Preference is given to Minnesota authors or to authors with books set in northeastern Minnesota, especially Duluth.

The library will provide table space: each 2.5′ x 6′ table will be shared by two authors. Tables will be located throughout the library, in the nonfiction/reference area, in the fiction area, and in Youth Services. The transport and arrangement of book promotional materials, displays, books to sell and payment options are the responsibility of the author.

If you are interested in participating please fill out an application on the Duluth Public Library website. Please submit this application form by Nov. 13 in order to participate. Space is limited so tables will be assigned on a first-come basis. Once all tables are reserved, applications will be placed on a waiting list.

EventsDuluth Public Library

The “Portrait of an Artist” Art Opening at the Duluth Art Institute

This is the Oct. 15 art opening of Sarah Brokke’s show, “Portrait of an Artist.”

Art, Videos
Ashwabay Alliance / Big Top Chautauqua
Glensheen Lantern Tours 2026

PDD Video Lab: Halloween Edition

Happy Halloween, PDDers. Press play on the video above and select your favorite soundtrack below.

And don’t forget, we’re looking for your Halloween banners. Send them to [email protected]

Music, Photos, VideosCreepy, Halloween, Video Lab

Artificial trailer

vimeo.com

Some familiar locations in this preview clip by Lance Karasti.

Videos
FDLTCC: Pumpin Run
Fond-du-Luth Casino: Sunday Fun Play

Question 3: Method for setting fee paid to Duluth city councilors

Duluth Charter Amendment - Method for setting fee paid to city councilors

After publishing the Duluth 2015 General Election Sample Ballot, a question arose. We’ve been hearing a lot about ranked-choice voting and Lakeside liquor sales, but what’s the deal with question #3? (more…)

News and Current Affairs, PoliticsElection Information, Queries

Still curious?

Curious Goods in Superior

What’s the deal with Curious Goods in Superior?

If you’ve driven by 1717-1/2 Winter St. and wondered if the store ever opens, well, it doesn’t … but in a way it’s always open, on the Internet. For the past decade or so Curious Goods has basically been a warehouse for eBay items from the seller Curious-g.

RecommendationsQueries, Superior
Glensheen Lantern Tours 2026
FDLTCC: Pumpin Run

Project manager wanted for 10-month media collaboration

The journalism program at the University of Minnesota Duluth is looking for a part-time project manager to assist in coordinating the “One River, Many Stories” media collaboration project.

Funded through a Knight Foundation Fund grant from the Duluth Superior Area Community Foundation, the project will test ways media collaboration can inspire innovation and nurture engagement among professional journalists, educators and citizen storytellers in the Duluth-Superior community. In April 2016, the media in northern Minnesota and northwest Wisconsin will give special attention to one topic: The St. Louis River. Newspapers, television and radio stations, local bloggers, photographers, videographers, university, college and high school journalism programs, and citizen storytellers will produce news articles, documentaries, podcasts and other media about the historic St. Louis River corridor.

Link to full job description

News and Current AffairsHelp Wanted, Media

Duluth 2015 General Election Sample Ballot

Duluth MN General Election Ballot 2015

News and Current Affairs, PoliticsElection Information
Ashwabay Alliance / Big Top Chautauqua
Pier B Resort: Rise and Dine

This Week: pumpkins, curling, Bach and more

Untitled design
Here’s a bit of what you’ll find on this week’s PDD Calendar:

Glensheen Mansion needs pumpkin carvers, Duluth Curling Club is giving a free lesson to curling newbs, the new Lake Superior Ojibwe Gallery is dedicated, the Twin Ports live radio soap opera continues, candidates for Duluth city offices discuss poverty and Bachmaster Angela Hewitt performs.

Duluth extreme metallers Vitamin Death release an album, DanceWorks hits Marshall Performing Arts Center, Glensheen’s pumpkin-carvers (see above) display their work, One Roof Community Housing throws a fundraiser, the Minnesota Ballet celebrates a half-century in operation and a fundraiser for violence victim Matthew Rewald is happening at Mr. D’s in West Duluth.

Events

Perspectives on a Rainbow

Mary Lou Williams

After Mary Lou Williams’‘ rainbow photo was shared last Monday on the PDD Facebook page, three other perspectives emerged. From left to right below are photos by Paul Gudmundson, Laurie Newland and Tyler Day. (Click to view larger.)

Paula Gudmundson Laurie Newland Tyler Day

Why are there so many photos of rainbows, and what’s on the other side? Well, according to reports from Kermit the Frog, rainbows are visions, but only illusions, and rainbows have nothing to hide.

PhotosRainbows
FDLTCC: Pumpin Run

Video Archive: Chainsaw Artist John Gage

Video produced by Margo Devich and Nathan Steigman for UWS Studio 2; shot in Two Harbors on Sept. 17, 1995.

Art, VideosTwo Harbors, UWS, Video Archive

Duluth’s Mark Sertich on CBS Evening News

Tonight Mark Sertich became the second Duluthian to be featured on the CBS Evening News in the past month. Just 18 days after St. Scholastica Saints kicking coach Sister Lisa Maurer was profiled on the program, Sertich was featured in a segment with “On the Road” correspondent Steve Hartman.

Sertich is a 1939 Denfeld graduate and World War II veteran who, at age 94, still plays hockey with a group of Duluth firefighters.

News and Current Affairs, SportsCBS, Denfeld High School, Hockey, Television
Vision Pro: Clear Vision

Unnur Andrea – “Walking on Nails”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcxcDfpsRBY

Back by popular demand, Unnur Andrea’s video shot at the Duluth Owls Club. It was originally posted on PDD on Jan. 15, 2013, but was mysteriously suspended by YouTube.

Music, VideosOwls Club, Unnur Andrea

R.I.P. Mr. Richard H. Gastler

Richard Gastler

Longtime Denfeld High School economics teacher Dick Gastler died on Thursday, Oct. 15, at the age of 79. Among many great teachers at Denfeld, Mr. Gastler would have to be considered the most famous of his era. He was a ham. He broke into song all the time. He frequently digressed into stories about growing up in Chaska. He wore cheesy leisure suits, famously sporting the same one every day during a stretch of 1984 when he was raising money to fight hunger — a stunt that landed him on Good Morning America. The suit was burned when Mr. Gastler reached his fundraising goal. The ashes are still in a trophy case at the school. (more…)

R.I.P.Denfeld High School
Fond-du-Luth Casino: Sunday Fun Play
Glensheen Lantern Tours 2026

Old Casino Signs

Casino SignsI noticed these in the alley behind Fond-du-Luth Casino yesterday. Anyone got a pickup truck and a nice loft space?

History

Selective Focus: Coming Home

Paul McIntyre

Paul McIntyre, untitled

The idea of “coming home” propels nearly all our endeavors, knowing we are tethered to other people, to familiar, comforting things. For anyone lacking a stable, sane place, or those exiled by circumstance, the capacity to venture is stunted while the desire to find moorings never leaves us. Emily Norton’s “Family Motto” (below) states well this simple, not easily-attained aspiration. (more…)

Art, PhotosSelective Focus
Pizza Luce: Dililio
Weis Eye Center

North Country Trail nears connection to Superior Hiking Trail

North Country Trail at MN and WI border

A new 4-mile section of the North Country National Scenic Trail, located 17 miles southwest of Superior, opens Saturday, bringing the trail another step closer to connecting to Minnesota’s Superior Hiking Trail.

The new segment crosses the University of Wisconsin-Superior’s MacQuarrie Wetlands in western Douglas County and features scenic overlooks of the Nemadji River Valley and the basin of Glacial Lake Duluth. It also crosses a section of Douglas County Forest and Wisconsin DNR lands.

Link to driving map

OutdoorsHiking, North Country Trail, Superior Hiking Trail

Keep your weather eye open. And use Duluth Imperial flour.

US Weather and Wind Signal Flags

HistoryDuluth Imperial Mill Company
Glensheen Lantern Tours 2026
Fond-du-Luth Casino: Sunday Fun Play

Art and Literature about the Environment

wolfflow2 wolfflow3 wolfflow1

One more post about art and literature this week … some poetry readings and some paintings about the environment, in different ways.

I attended the Wolf/Flow art opening, hosted by Stephanie Johnson and Angie Arden, at the Zeitgeist Arts gallery.The work shimmers with the energy of collaboration, with passion for the natural world, and with exploration of a variety of media. And, if you contributed a line to the community poem at Wolf/Flow 2, you may be happily surprised to see what became of it. (more…)

Art

Rink Relief: Episode 1

vimeo.com

Video by Rawlin Kessler shot at Rip Williams Memorial Rink at Chester Park.

Random, VideosChester Park, Skateboarding
Glensheen Lantern Tours 2026
Pier B Resort: Rise and Dine

Lift Bridge Facelifts

Lift-Bridge-Facelifts

Found on Tumblr, Lift Bridge Facelifts – “A study in removing Duluth’s iconic Aerial Lift Bridge out of the endless logos where it dwells.”

ArtAerial Lift Bridge