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Vincent Bugliosi, a Range kid who left his mark on the world
The most commercially successful author ever to hail from Northern Minnesota’s Iron Range region was Vincent Bugliosi. An accomplished Los Angeles attorney, the man who prosecuted Charles Manson and wrote on topics from conspiracies to philosophy, Bugliosi died Monday at the age of 80. His book “Helter Skelter,” an account of his involvement in the Charles Manson case,…
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Debunking many immigrant family legends
Every year I read the names at the Hibbing Community College graduation ceremony. That means I’ve become unusually accustomed to pronouncing names that originate from areas all over Europe. In recent years, an influx of students from Africa have added new challenges to my elocution. I am from a land of immigrants but walk around…
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‘Mr. Power’s undaunted fighting spirit’
There isn’t much in Iron Range newspapers these days that can rightly be called “refreshing,” but something in this Sunday’s Hibbing Daily Tribune surely fit the bill. Too bad it was a story originally published 100 years ago. Jack Lynch, my former colleague and neighbor from my Hibbing Tribune days, always does a good job finding…
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Great Northern Radio Show in Grand Marais on 6/13
On Saturday, June 13, we’ll broadcast a new edition of my Great Northern Radio Show live from the Arrowhead Center for the Arts in Grand Marais, Minnesota. We’re really excited about this one for a few reasons. One, the location. It’s a summer weekend in one of the most beautiful parts of Minnesota. Two, the…
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Chief Bemidji statue to be dedicated June 6
For many, the history of Northern Minnesota is wrapped up in the fictional story of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox, adorable figures found on display in towns like Brainerd or Bemidji. But in Bemidji, a remarkable cultural reclamation is taking place. A statue of the Ojibwa leader Shaynowishkung, often known as Chief Bemidji, the…
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Highway 53 funding part of bonding bill deal
State leaders are announcing that a $373 million bonding bill will be part of the upcoming special legislative session, including $140 million in funding for the Highway 53 relocation/bridge project that fizzled out at the end of the regular session. From Patrick Condon in the Star Tribune: Dayton has yet to call a special session, which…
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Timeless sound from Rich Mattson & the Northstars
When they performed in my Great Northern Radio Show in Ely last summer, I referred to Rich Mattson and Germaine Gemberling as “the First Couple of the Iron Range music scene.” The pair, based at Sparta Sound in a nearly abandoned mining location near Gilbert, is involved in so many projects and affiliated with so…
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State cuts mining lease costs for U.S. Steel
The Associated Press reports that after a unanimous vote of the state executive council yesterday, Minnesota will reduce the royalties owed by U.S. Steel from 91 cents to 75 cents per ton for iron ore mined from state land. Those royalties pay into funds that support schools and universities in Minnesota. This was the result of a direct…
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Embattled RAMS settles on four candidates for top job
The Range Association of Municipalities and Schools (RAMS) has announced four candidates for its long vacant position of executive director. The position drew significant controversy earlier this year when the RAMS board named State Sen. David Tomassoni to the position, presenting a widely-perceived conflict of interest for Tomassoni and the group that lobbies St. Paul…
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Local film festival to mark 10 years of ‘North Country’
The sixth annual first ever Duluth-Superior Film Festival opens today in downtown Duluth and runs through Sunday, June 7. Local films and those with a Minnesota connection will be screened for audiences at popular Duluth cultural sites including the Zinema Theater on Superior Street, Clyde Iron Works, The Red Star Lounge and Teatro Zuccone. The festival…
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Rare moose sighting near Cherry
My social media feed has been abuzz with pictures and tales of moose patrolling Highway 37 near my ancestral lands of Cherry, Minnesota. The Mesabi Daily News reports this morning that the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources has issued a warning to motorists to be on alert for two young female moose in the area just…
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The night Jesse Ventura ‘shocked the world’
Nate Silver’s popular polling aggregator and statistical analysis website FiveThirtyEight.com, now housed with ESPN, is doing a series of short documentaries about situations where polling shaped the news. The one posted this week features the 1998 election of Gov. Jesse Ventura (I-Minn.), one of the most compelling political stories in state history. Well worth a watch:…
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Ely Folk School slated for June 6 opening
In a digital world, one is often left to ask, Who is it that actually knows how to do stuff? Make things. Build structures. Produce crafts and useful items. Get by when the power goes out. Who does that now? Enter the Ely Folk School, slated to open on June 6. A story about the…
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Chisholm teen in Scripps National Spelling Bee today
An Iron Range eighth-grader is competing right now in Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C. Cade Klimek from Chisholm High School will be representing Minnesota while spelling alongside the nation’s best today. Preliminaries: Wednesday, May 27, 8am – 4:45pm EDT. Streaming live on ESPN3. Semifinals: Thursday, May 28, 10am – 1pm EDT. Live on ESPN2. Championship Finals:…
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What’s behind Mesabi Nugget’s long term idle?
This week, Indiana-based Steel Dynamics announced the indefinite idling of its Minnesota properties, including Mesabi Nugget in Hoyt Lakes and Mining Resources near Chisholm, a scram mining operation that produced iron concentrate used by Mesabi Nugget. About 200 people will lose their jobs and there is no clear sense of when these properties will reopen, though Steel…