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Tuesday is last chance to file for many offices
Tuesday, May 31, brings the last day to file for local, state and federal offices in Minnesota. While there are some interesting legislative and county races shaping up across Northern Minnesota in 2016 (I’ll have more on those Wednesday), something else stood out to me. City council races on the Iron Range are fairly quiet. In…
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Fired up for the end of school
The Jack Pine must burn to live. While most everything in nature is adapted to avoid fire, the Jack Pine welcomes the flame. Old Jack’s branches and needles evolved to attract and spread fire. Indeed, most of its tightly-sealed cones contain seeds that will only be released by temperatures above 112 degrees. It’s amazing to…
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Giant iron ships sail on
Last Saturday I was camping with my family. In the cold, dark hours of a restless second sleep, I dreamt. In my dream I spied a pile of overburden on the edge of an Iron Range town. We call them mine dumps. Through the window of some public place, a restaurant perhaps, I observed a haul truck winding its way up the rocky…
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Congratulations, whoever you are!
The gold-lined invitation glinted from the pile of mail, classing up the usual stack of junk and bills. Addressed by hand, the heavy stock envelope coughed out yet another envelope from inside the first one. This envelope was smaller, but meant business. Inside this fat envelope was a collection of photos of a proud member…
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Four advance to DFL primary in House 6A
After five ballots, Iron Range DFLers opted not to endorse a candidate in the race to succeed State Rep. Carly Melin (DFL-Hibbing) in House District 6A. The endorsing convention was held this morning and into the afternoon at Hibbing Community College. All five candidates had stated they would not abide by the endorsement anyway, so a competitive…
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Duluth Superior Film Festival launches June 1
The Duluth Superior Film Festival opens June 1-5, 2016 in venues across the Twin Ports and even up in the big city of Cook, Minnesota. According to festival organizers, this year’s festival will have a distinctly local vibe: Because of the outstanding rebate and tax incentive program in MN and on The Iron Range, much of…
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Mesabi Academy to close
The Kidspeace Mesabi Academy juvenile corrections and school facility in Buhl will close at the end of June. The move comes amid controversy over an American Public Media investigative report on allegations of abuse and interference with a county investigation at the facility. American Public Media is the parent organization of Minnesota Public Radio. Those allegations have…
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Junkyard Politics in Northern Minnesota
Another election year has arrived in Northern Minnesota, though this is hardly news. In our country it’s difficult to tell when there isn’t an election. American society has built up a politics tolerance that would require a rigorous treatment program if it were, say, whiskey. Thus my approach to the 2016 election, so far, has…
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Strong Towns on the Iron Range
Since Monday, it’s been “Strong Towns” week on the Mesabi Iron Range. Chuck Marohn and his team have held special discussions about planning more durable, sustainable communities across the Iron Range. Readers here might be interested in a couple things I did in support of Chuck’s tour. I previewed the Strong Towns events in my Sunday column about…
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Rethinking strength of Iron Range towns
The small working class towns of Minnesota’s iron ranges were founded for a profoundly simple purpose. Each village cut into the thick forests of Northern Minnesota to provide housing and supplies within walking distance of an iron mine. Few towns grew beyond that purpose. Dozens were were abandoned after a decade or two. As the…
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We are not monsters
The world keeps turning on the Mesabi Iron Range. Lawmakers defend the IRRRB in St. Paul, while the local paper lambasts a city council for a foreign steel pipe found in a construction project. At risk, we are told, is “our way of life.” Controversies come and go. Another election year bulges on the horizon. Two…
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Remer, MN: ‘Home of Bigfoot’
I have a nagging question about Sasquatch. If this giant ape-man of the northern boreal forests is real, where is he in the oral tradition of native peoples? Wouldn’t Sasquatch be all over those stories? It stands to reason that Sasquatch creatures would have been more plentiful and less inhibited in the days before industrialization, right?…
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Ticks, ethics & bioeconomics on the Range
What do ticks, digital ethics and “the bioeconomy” have in common? The short answer is that dogs have no use for studying these things, but the University of Minnesota does. The University of Minnesota is sending some of its researchers around the state for its “Minnesota Sparks” tour. The idea is to encourage broader conversations about interesting…
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Hibtac expansion to displace mine view
Hibbing Taconite is running out of room to mine, so it needs to expand or close. It’s penned in by highways and the Iron Range cities of Hibbing and Chisholm, however, which means something would have to give for this 40-year-old mine to continue. The Hibbing Daily Tribune reported Sunday that the mine has stated its initial plans. In…
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Dylan Fest 2016 coming to Duluth, Hibbing
Fun Fact: The IRRRB, the Blandin Foundation, M&Ms and Bob Dylan all turn 75 this year. This is the kind of information that passes through my mind on a lovely May day in Northern Minnesota. It’s been a few years since we closed up shop at Dylan Days in Hibbing. I’ve now totally expunged from…