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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…
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Essar ramps up Nashwauk construction
Construction is accelerating at the long awaited $1.9 billion Essar iron mine near Nashwauk, while Essar now says it’s optimistic about producing direct reduced iron products here. In a tour of the site on May 21 with Mitch Brunfelt, Essar’s assistant general counsel and director of government and public relations, I took pictures and observed…
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Duluth wraps up Dylan Fest, starts new era
Bob Dylan’s birthday of May 24 passed me by this weekend with little fanfare. In years past as organizer for Dylan Days in Dylan’s hometown of Hibbing, Minnesota, I’d spend that day with Dylan fans from all over the world. This year, we had made the tough decision to let the event go in our…
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Whatever gets you through the night
As a teenager l slept in the basement on a mildewed, brown-speckled mattress in the same room as a sump pump that rattled to life every time it rained. No, this isn’t the start of a long lost Dickens novel set on the Iron Range. I slept here by choice, giving my sister my warm,…
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U.S. Steel responds to Keewatin Taconite rumors
UPDATE: U.S. Steel spokesperson Courtney Boone just told me that the company did not fire 50 management workers at Keewatin Taconite today. My source was in error. Thus, I am retracting the post for now. The mine really is going into indefinite shutdown next week, however, with some staff staying on for scheduled maintenance projects until…
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Open Duluth mayor race now a contest
At long last, City Councilor Emily Larson has an opponent in the open 2015 Duluth mayor’s race. Chuck Horton, a boxing trainer and promotor, announced his campaign this week. Larson, a DFLer, would still considered a favorite against the more conservative Horton in the generally liberal city of Duluth. But Horton is (pun intended) a fighter. His…
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Hwy 53 funds fall victim to turbulent session
Among the many casualties of the rocky legislative session was primary funding for the relocation of Highway 53, the road that connects Northern Minnesota’s Iron Range to Duluth and the rest of the state. Now, local elected leaders and Department of Transportation officials say that unless Highway 53 funding is part of the anticipated special…
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Bob Dylan among Letterman’s last guests
I’m working on a column about David Letterman’s retirement from the Late Show this week. I wrote about Letterman and late night TV some back in April, but the reality of it is upon us. Wednesday will be Letterman’s last show and the guests haven’t been announced. But Tuesday’s show brings a big name with…
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IRRRB mulls $33 million 2016 budget
Even though the legislative session may go to the wire tonight at midnight, Iron Range lawmakers — who comprise the statutory Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board — will meet Tuesday morning in St. Paul to hash out the agency’s $33 million FY 2016 budget. “I am pleased that over half of the proposed budget…
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A simmering economic crisis on the Iron Range
You know the old saying. If you drop a frog in a pot of boiling water it will hop right out. But if you put a frog in a pot of cool water, gradually turning up the heat, the frog won’t realize it’s boiling to death. Politicians of all stripes have boiled a bog’s worth of rhetorical frogs over the years.…
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On shapes and letters, sound and fury
Today, the Minnesota’s legislative leaders and Gov. Mark Dayton remain in a standoff over education funding. GOP House Speaker and DFL Senate Majority Leader Tom Bakk announced a comprehensive budget agreement in principle late last week, but they neglected to ensure that DFL Gov. Mark Dayton would sign the deal. That prospect is now in doubt. Dayton’s well-quoted…
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MN sulfate rule compromise treads water
While the economy will be the bigger story on the Iron Range this summer, we have a development in the ongoing saga of Minnesota’s wild rice sulfate standard and the industries and communities it affects. Earlier this spring, the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency proposed adjusting the 10 mg per liter sulfate standard designed to preserve the…