Carl Kuchenbecker was apparently responsible for nine primates disappearing into the woods near Kingsbury Creek during his many years as proprietor of The Same Old Place in West Duluth. The story of a “ringtailed monkey” named Bobby landed on the front page of the Duluth Herald on Oct. 18, 1941.
This postcard image, touched up a bit from an eBay listing, shows The Same Old Place tourist information center and cabins at Fairmount Park in West Duluth.
This photo is dated April 19, 1910 — 115 years ago today. It shows a house with two adults standing against a wooden fence and a child sitting on the fence. The image is from a postcard with writing indicating the house was in West Duluth.
Family Rise Together Executive Director ChaQuana McEntyre stands outside the Sunshine Cafe, 5719 Grand Ave. The social service organization purchased the diner and will remodel it to serve as a food-service industry small-business incubator. (Photo by Lissa Maki)
A shuttered building that once housed a landmark West Duluth cafe won’t reopen with breakfast specials and counter seating but new owners will use the space for a program to train ambitious food entrepreneurs and deliver meals.
St. Louis County records show the former Sunshine Cafe, 5719 Grand Ave., was purchased in December by the Duluth social service organization Family Rise Together for $230,000. The nonprofit started renovations on the historic building this winter and has launched a fundraising campaign to install a state-of-the-art, commercial-grade kitchen inside the space.
This postcard shows the Riverview Motel in West Duluth, which was replaced in the early 2000s by Westgate Townhomes.
One hundred years ago plans were emerging to build what would later be called the Arrowhead Bridge, which spanned the St. Louis River from Grassy Point in West Duluth to Billings Park in Superior. Construction of the bridge was completed in 1927. It was dismantled in 1985 after the opening of the Richard I. Bong Memorial Bridge.
This undated postcard, published by Gallagher’s Studio, shows the Good Shephard Church and School at 5901 Raleigh St. in West Duluth. The building was completed in 1959 and the first mass was celebrated on Christmas Eve, 65 years ago.
The advertisement above is from a 1920 issue of Hardware World magazine. Apparently hardware stores were tucking a lot of merchandise into boxes and drawers back then instead of displaying as much of it as possible, so the Duluth Show Case Company emerged as an innovator in retail-store cabinet manufacturing.
West Duluth is ground zero for the latest EmbalmingEva music video, shot at the Jade Fountain and under the bright lights of the Korner Store.
From Wikipedia: “An ice spike is an ice formation, often in the shape of an inverted icicle, that projects upwards from the surface of a body of frozen water. Ice spikes created by natural processes on the surface of small bodies of frozen water have been reported for many decades, although their occurrence is quite rare. … Natural ice spikes can grow into shapes other than a classic spike shape, and have been variously reported as ice candles, ice towers or ice vases as there is no standard nomenclature for these other forms.”
Mural artists Kevin Ballecer, left, and Mela Nguyen are painting the exterior of Chicken n’ Whaaat?! on Central Avenue in West Duluth. The pair also painted murals for Burger Paradox on Superior Street. (Photos by Mark Nicklawske).
A family-owned restaurant group that helped revitalize Lincoln Park will expand outside the neighborhood for the first time with a new fast-casual chicken eatery attached to a West Duluth gas station.
MidCoast Catering owner Jonathan Reznick stands outside his Central Avenue buildings. Reznick is remodeling the property on the left to create a new event center called The Tasting Room. (Photos by Mark Nicklawske)
A popular Duluth food truck and catering business plans to expand operations later this summer when it opens a new event center adjacent to its West Duluth headquarters.
The Rambler food truck and MidCoast Catering owner Jonathan Reznick said he purchased the Michael Talarico law offices at 313 N. Central Ave. last May. Reznick connected the building to his catering kitchen next door and launched remodeling efforts this spring. The new space will be called the Tasting Room.
To mark the start of the 2024 baseball season we take a look back at the Big League Manager Baseball Game, which was made in Duluth beginning, as near as can be determined, 70 years ago in 1954.
The Duluth News Tribune reports an 80-unit apartment complex called the Residence is being planned on the former Holiday Stationstore location at 3401 Grand Ave. The 1.9-acre site is between the Wheeler Athletic Complex and the ore docks in West Duluth. Merge Urban Development Group, headquartered in Cedar Falls, Iowa, purchased the land from the Duluth Economic Development Authority in 2022.
1939 aerial photo from the UM
MnDOT’s John Bray wrote in The Will and the Way: “Approximately 700 homes were razed or moved in West Duluth” to make way for Interstate 35.
