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‘Everything just fits together naturally’
When settlers came to Northern Minnesota they found timber so tall and plentiful that they built Chicago with it. When Chicago burned down they built it again. New prospectors found iron ore so rich they could shovel it straight into eastern blast furnaces to make the steel that built a growing nation, supplying two world…
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Lessons from a decade of parenting (I’ve learned nothing)
“What size shirt does George wear?” my mom asked a few days before my son’s birthday. “I don’t know,” I said. “Kinda big. He’s bigger than Doug (his twin brother). But not taller. Doug is taller. They’re both kinda tall. They wear shirts. Sometimes I pay for the shirts, but not always. I don’t know…
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Nolan running again in 2016; no opponent yet
In a fiery speech at his annual barbecue fundraiser, U.S. Rep. Rick Nolan (D-MN8) announced he would seek another term in Congress in 2016. Nolan represents Minnesota’s Eighth Congressional District, a large region that includes Northeastern and Central Minnesota. MN-8 has been considered a swing district since 2010, when Rep. Jim Oberstar was surprisingly defeated…
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Northern Lights Music Festival brings classics back to Range
The Northern Lights Music Festival is returning to the Iron Range this summer with its annual classical music and opera tour across the region. Last summer, I spoke with Veda Zupancic, the accomplished musician and director from Aurora who founded the event. This year, the Northern Lights festival kicks off today and includes events that run through July 20.…
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Chris Pratt was born on the Iron Range
Last week, I joined the legions of Summer 2015 movie-goers to see “Jurassic World” starring everyman action hero Chris Pratt. I also delighted in a little known connection between this film and the Iron Range of Northern Minnesota. And no, it’s not this: Guy who unsuccessfully weaponized velociraptors in #JurassicWorld looks like MN Senate leader Tom Bakk…
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Summer of trials and tribulations on the Iron Range
The last few months of Iron Range politics and economics have been discouraging. That’s as polite as I can be in describing what’s happened: the repetitive, lazy assumptions of local media, the underreported stories of inside dealings, the overstatement of future economic growth from new kinds of mining and the understatement of the tremendous market pressures…
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Range business, gov’t leaders call for summit
In Sunday’s paper, the Mesabi Daily News published a story about the fact that Minnesota Power (Allete) executive Al Hodnick, former State Sen. Doug Johnson and IRRRB Commissioner Mark Phillips were joining to call for an Iron Range economic summit. From the Bill Hanna story: Hodnik wants an Iron Range economic summit soon to provide…
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All about that bass
He didn’t go fishing often. He lived near a lake, so that wasn’t the issue. He owned a fishing pole, so that wasn’t it either. He just realized that when grandpa took the kids fishing, he could watch old movies and no one would bother him. So he didn’t go fishing often. One day, the…
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Hockey’s iconic Hanson Brothers are ‘home’ on the Range
The Hanson Brothers — real life brothers and pro hockey veterans — are practically legend for anyone who follows hockey in Northern Minnesota. The cult classic “Slap Shot,” starring Paul Newman, cast Jeff, Steve and Jack Carlson to play themselves … along with Dave Hanson, an actor cast to replace Jack when he was called up…
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Hear the Grand Marais Great Northern Radio Show
You can now hear the podcast for the most recent Great Northern Radio Show we did up in Grand Marais on June 13. The show went well: great audience, sketch material and guests were strong on this one and the music fit the place like a glove. In addition to being a free download, you…
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Brick Rolled: new look for downtown Duluth’s Superior Street
The first time I went to downtown Duluth, Minnesota, I was a kid and among the things that stood out to me was the brick face of Superior Street. Whatever brick streets or sidewalks we had on the Iron Range had long been scraped up before my time and the concept was novel. This year, after…
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First-ever Ely Marathon will be run Sept. 26
If you’d like to run a marathon in a place where there are more moose, bears and wolves than usual, you’ve got a chance Sept. 26 with the first-ever Ely Marathon. Starting on the north arm of Burntside Lake, the marathon route follows the historic Echo Trail down into Winton and eventually ending in downtown Ely.…
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Northern MN art teacher crowned Miss Minnesota
A Northern Minnesota high school art teacher was crowned Miss Minnesota last Saturday and will now use her campaign for the Miss America crown to highlight education issues. Rachel Latuff is the art teacher at North Woods High School serving Cook and Orr. You can catch the whole story in this Tom Klein article from the hometown…
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With contracts looming, Range mines crunch numbers
No matter your job or politics, ten dollars is always ten dollars. By some reports, that’s how much money some Iron Range mines need to shave off their cost for a ton of taconite iron ore to survive the coming global steel industry contraction. John Myers at the Duluth News Tribune reported on this last weekend, highlighting…
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See active Iron Range mines or tour virtually
This Thursday brings the first of the Hibbing Taconite mine tours available via the Minnesota Discovery Center in Chisholm. The tours run every Thursday afternoon from June 25 to Aug. 6. The Hibbing Taconite mine tour takes you through an active iron mine and processing facility. You see how iron is blasted out of the ground and turned…