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Great Northern Radio Show: Aallotar
This week I’m busy preparing the Great Northern Radio Show, which makes its Season 3 debut this Saturday, Oct. 19 at Crosby-Ironton High School in Crosby, Minnesota. Please, consider joining us for the live show in Crosby (seating before 4:30 p.m., free!) or tuning in on the radio or live online feed (5-7 p.m.). Throughout…
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MNDOT phasing out deer crossing signs
The AP is reporting that the Minnesota Department of Transportation is phasing out deer crossing signs and signs that say “Slow, Children at Play.” Research shows that no one pays attention to these signs and that they give people a false sense of security. Speaking as someone who lives in the woods where there are…
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Federal government shutdown bears down
As the federal government shutdown wore on this past week the effects were felt everywhere. Nowhere was this more true than in our national parks, where the shutdown turned away visitors and left the animals therein to fend for themselves. This is their story. FOX ANNOUNCER: Thank you for watching ACTUAL FOX News continuing coverage…
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Bob Dylan rock opera set to drop this month
As a longtime coordinator and media representative for Dylan Days, the annual arts and music event in Bob Dylan’s Iron Range hometown of Hibbing, Minnesota, I’m used to receiving oddities in the mail. For instance, there was this notice about a new rock opera album being released featuring Bob Dylan music. The band, Diva De…
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Stewart Mills officially announces MN-8 candidacy
Republican scion of the Mills Fleet Farm business family Stewart Mills III announced his candidacy to challenge U.S. Rep. Rick Nolan (D-MN8) in 2014. He had been exploring a candidacy for several months with all signs pointing toward a run for office. Yesterday he made it official at events in Cloquet and Rush City. The…
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Minnesota blogger featured on Colbert Report
Kudos to my fellow greater Minnesota blogger Sally Jo Sorensen for her shout-out on last night’s Colbert Report on Comedy Central. She was the one who found the weird TV ad Tom Emmer did in Minnesota’s Sixth Congressional District, where he endorsed a construction company as a candidate for Congress. This is blatantly illegal, and…
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Iron Range solar company dubbed ‘Made-in-Minnesota’
After last year’s somewhat contentious legislative debate over a rebate program for Made-in-Minnesota solar panels, an Iron Range solar manufacturer has become the state’s first certified Minnesota-made solar company. From Mt. Iron-based Silicon Energy: October 7, 2013 – St. Paul, MN – Silicon Energy’s locally made solar photovoltaic (PV) modules have been awarded official certification…
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Physicists who inspired Soudan lab win Nobel Prize
The scientists who first theorized about the Higgs boson particle, the so-called (usually by non-physicists) “God Particle,” will share this year’s Nobel Prize for Physics. Normally that’s not something you’d see touted here on this unusual regional website, but it so happens that there is a sophisticated laboratory located deep beneath the Iron Range at…
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Minnesota DNR to allow extra fishing on Canisteo Pit
The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources will open a liberalized fishing season on the Canisteo Pit near Bovey, Minnesota from Oct. 17 until Dec. 1. The Canisteo has been rather infamous in recent years as it had flooded the city of Bovey, which required several million dollars in state aid to mitigate. Times have changed.…
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Shutdown spawns new nation of ‘Greatlandia’
Speaking of Minneapolis, a guy I know from the western Mesabi Iron Range has declared his house and yard apartment in Minneapolis as the sovereign nation of Greatlandia, citing distrust over the federal government’s inability to function. He and friends are crowd-sourcing funding to pay for the nascent nation. Their primary accomplishment so far seems…
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Minneapolis dating scene as depicted in the Times
Here’s this weird story from the New York Times about the Minneapolis dating scene. The lives depicted therein do not appeal to me, though that is no surprise given the fact that I’m wearing khaki pants in my country office right now. As soul-sucking and vacuous as all this seems to me, the story is…
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Shutdown clouds northern MN mining controversy
Northern MN mining controversy remains in the news here. We had a steady go of it a couple weeks ago. Then the government shut down and yet the debate continues. A Star Tribune report late last week showed that the mining company PolyMet has acknowledged that its proposed mine’s tailings pond would require 500 years…
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Bemidji mayor honors Muppet in front of Paul Bunyan
Video presented without commentary. Bemidji Mayor Rita Albright awards the key to the city to Sesame Street’s Grover in front of giant statues of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox. The video heats up just after two minutes. Related posts: No related posts.
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‘Duck Dynasty’ trend blossoms in Iron Range towns
I was talking to a student the other day and she showed me a cell phone picture of her first grade son dressed up as Si from “Duck Dynasty” for a homecoming dress-up day at their school. I imagine several schools are trying that out this year. “Duck Dynasty” is one of the biggest cultural…
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The art of building an Iron Range economy
One finds resistance discussing the diversification of northern Minnesota’s economy into areas outside natural resources. Convincing local leaders that real economic growth can come from abstract concepts like art and design is often as difficult as extracting 100 long tons of iron ore from the earth. I mean, you can’t even use dynamite, which would…