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Breaking ice for the start of Duluth harbor spring
Today is the spring equinox. Here in Northern Minnesota, this event signifies something about daylight but little about weather. We’ve been having arguments with one of our boys about how the “first day of spring” doesn’t legally absolve you from wearing a jacket. But there’s another sure sign of spring on display in the Port…
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Itasca conference aids navigation of ‘Post-Truth Era’
The peacock is really just a 12-pound pheasant with a fancy tail that is probably delicious. It evolved and lives today because potential mates and predators alike believe they are much larger birds with many, many eyes. It’s hardly the only species built on deception, but it’s a particularly successful one. It’s got nothing on…
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Phifer scores early wins; DFL convention, primary loom
Local Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party delegates convened county conventions across Minnesota’s Eighth Congressional District these past few weeks. Through hours of messy, complicated political wrangling, they elected delegates who will endorse one of five announced candidates at the April 14 DFL convention in Duluth. And Leah Phifer is winning. She hasn’t won. She doesn’t have the endorsement…
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A Northern Minnesota movie comes home
No industry confounds the people of Middle America more than the entertainment business. Hollywood and New York stand as shining beacons of wonder, drawing the ambitions and hopes of our teenage thespians and aspiring new media pioneers. But buried beneath this extravagant reverie is a truth; we are typically the rubes shelling out for tickets…
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Immigrant stories bring fresh energy to the Iron Range
With St. Urho’s Day honoring Finnish heritage today and the Irish fete of St. Patrick’s Day tomorrow, we may reflect on the roots of many who live in Northern Minnesota. It’s been a long time, but not that long, since the Mesabi Iron Range was majority foreign born. Nevertheless, that happened. The melding of immigrant…
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My thoughts on gun debate in Daily Yonder
Today, the rural American online magazine The Daily Yonder published a piece I wrote about guns. It’s more personal than political. This piece reflects what I think weighs at the heart of the gun rights/gun control debate. I know that many have tread over this controversial topic. My comments section stands ready to melt down…
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2018 Minnesota High School All Hockey Hair Team
Nothing quite takes over the state of Minnesota like the annual high school hockey tournament. The quality of play resembles the Olympics. They sell out the arena for a week. And the hair flows free. That’s right, the Minnesota hockey tournament has its own spinoff sensations, including the Minnesota State High School All Hockey Hair…
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Seizing real power in our times
Sometimes I have a great notion that a tall building could be erected on the corner of First and Howard in downtown Hibbing. Bustling with commerce, brimming with human progress, this grand edifice would become a beacon for a new age of internal improvement of our Iron Range city. We could restore the parks, scrub…
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Who eats whom in Nashwauk mine showdown?
There’s an old trope you see in a lot of cartoons and movies. Someone is running through a jungle or forest, pursued by some fearsome beast. Only at some point an even more fearsome beast leaps from the shadows to snatch and devour the previous monster. And just as THAT creature takes off after our…
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U.S. Steel to reopen Granite City Works
When the steel industry hit the skids three years ago, one of the biggest signals of woe was the shuttering of U.S. Steel’s mill in Granite City, Illinois in 2016. That mill took iron ore from the Mesabi Range. Company officials cited its closure as one of the reasons for the idling of Keewatin Taconite.…
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Endorsement politics in Minnesota’s Eighth District
On April 14, almost 200 Eighth District DFL delegates will meet in Duluth to endorse a successor to retiring U.S. Rep. Rick Nolan. Five candidates want the job. Five candidates will seek the endorsement. But considerable speculation remains over whether some of them press on to a Aug. 14 primary regardless of the convention outcome. Former FBI…
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Hainey to run for Iron Range State House seat
With State Rep. Jason Metsa running for Congress, his vacated House 6B seat becomes an interesting undercard in the impending Iron Range political scrum of 2018. Today, the first DFL candidate announced his candidacy. Shaun Hainey, an employee in the St. Louis County assessor’s office, is a hobby farmer and union member from Pike Township…
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Farewell video stores, your strange era is over
Forbes, Minnesota, lies on the four corners of Highways 7 and 16 just off the central line for the Duluth, Missabe, and Iron Range Railroad. The railroad was there before the roads, one of the early routes hauling iron ore from the Mesabi Range to the docks in West Duluth. Those tracks were the reason…
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Trump’s steel tariffs rile markets, please miners
Last week I wrote that “The Steel War is Nigh.” That day has come. On Thursday, President Trump announced a 25 percent tariff on most foreign steel. He cited Section 232, essentially arguing that the tariffs were in the interest of American national security. Most nations typically discourage using that nebulous language, because any nation…
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DFL lawmaker Jason Metsa enters Eighth District race
Today, State Rep. Jason Metsa (DFL-Virginia) announced his bid for the DFL nomination for Congress in Minnesota’s Eighth District. “I am running for Congress because I know that we only make progress for Northern Minnesota families when we have each others’ backs and stand up to fight for each other,” said Metsa in his announcement.…