A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
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For decades, Marcie Stolberg has kept the island next to her campground as sacred space, aware of the stories of long-ago Native American battles and tragedy. It was there, according to the 1937 novel, "Wawina: A Beautiful Story of an Indian Princess" by Chief Northwind (Joseph Northrup's pen name), that two stubborn chiefs refused to make peace, their children met a tragic end, and a huge battle took place. A walk around Knife Island today reveals mostly undisturbed greenery - trees,...
Editor's note: Find the fair schedule below this story. This weekend people from the greater Carlton County area will gather in Barnum to celebrate the 131st Carlton County fair. Last year saw a record 40,000 people attend the fair after Covid-19 shut down the annual gathering in 2020. The Carlton County event continues to be one of the largest county fairs in the region. Fair manager Lindsey Larson said phone inquiries are up and she anticipates the number of entries for needlework, canning,... Full story
This week, we're happy to share more of what the Pine Knot News has learned about the 5,000-pound millstone pulled by the city of Cloquet from resident Bill Stolberg's yard. The millstone was used at the paper mill in pulp manufacturing. It would be "mounted on a geared pedestal ... and the pulp fiber would be crushed between the rotating millstone and a stationary stone," said an email from Sappi's Tom Radovich, managing director of the mill in Cloquet. The fiber was pinched and elongated...
Kettle River's main street was bustling Saturday, as the small town celebrated its annual Ma & Pa Kettle Days event. Politicians, vendors and others – including the Moose Lake Historical Society and the Starr Club – lined the city's Main Street. The sounds of music from under the big top provided a backdrop for many conversations between old friends, shoppers and those trying to decide which candidate they will vote for. Dan Reed, who orchestrated this year's event with a committee of vol...
A pole building burned in Skelton Township, outside Barnum, on Saturday, Aug. 13. A passerby reported the fire on the 4400 block of County Road 6 at 11:46 p.m. Responding emergency personnel found nobody injured, but a pole building that was a total loss along with its contents, a Carlton County Sheriff’s Office news release said. Barnum, Moose Lake and Kettle River fire departments responded to the fire, along with sheriff’s deputies and Essentia Health-Moose Lake paramedics. Deputies learned the homeowner had been using a wood stove in the...
A study of the Minnesota Highway 33 corridor through Cloquet is being conducted to help create a transportation plan in the area, said a Minnesota Department of Transportation news release this week. The Arrowhead Regional Development Commission and MnDOT are studying the state highway, in part, by gaining public feedback through a virtual open house available through Sept. 30. “The goal of the transportation plan is to look at pedestrian and bicycle safety along Highway 33 in Cloquet and develop a long-range plan and vision for potential s...
Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College welcomed Indigenous-serving educators from across the world over the past week, hosting the annual gathering of the World Indigenous Nations Higher Education Consortium. Guests and local residents danced together at a drum and dance exhibition Saturday, and the fun continued Monday with canoe races and Baaga'adowewin (traditional stick lacrosse) on Tuesday. In addition to bringing people together, the free events helped illustrate the significance of t...
The Wrenshall school board will convene for a special meeting Aug. 24 to hear results of an investigation into possible misconduct by the school’s information technology director. The board will gather at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday at the school to learn what Edina-based Red Cedar Consulting found out during days of interviews related to a comment made by technology director Jaime Hopp. Hopp is alleged to have profanely alluded to “killing” the district superintendent while in the staff lounge in June. Another district employee overheard the threa...
Cloquet city councilors and Mayor Roger Maki voted unanimously Tuesday to uphold the city’s subdivision ordinance requiring sidewalks in any new subdivisions, despite a planning commission recommendation to the contrary. City planner/zoning administrator Al Cottingham told councilors that the three members of the planning commission recommended approval of a variance from the subdivision code for developer James Kuklis for phase 2 of his Trails Edge subdivision, to be located southwest of Trail Drive and 18th Street. The proposed plat shows 13...
The filing period for Carlton County, the state of Minnesota, and the city of Cloquet was in May, but the filing period for remaining cities in Carlton County ended Tuesday, Aug. 16. Now that filing periods and August’s primary races have concluded, what follows is a list of all candidates running for public office in the Nov. 8 general election (*incumbent): School board filings Cloquet (elect 3: Ted Lammi*, Gary “Hawk” Huard*, Jamie Graham, David Battaglia*, Sarah Plante Buhs) Barnum (elect 3: Betty A. Anderson, Dawn Hultgren, Jessica Unkel... Full story
Shirley Magnuson, 83, has been selected as the female Outstanding Senior Citizen for Carlton County this year. She will be honored during a ceremony at noon at the Carlton County fair Friday, Aug. 19 in the Hartman Pavilion. Shirley told of those cold days standing outside storefronts, faithfully ringing the bell for the Salvation Army's Red Kettle during the Christmas season. "It would sometimes get down to 20 below," she said. "But I was prepared, I wore four layers of clothes." Magnuson's... Full story
The Carlton-Wrenshall Raptors football program won’t take the field for varsity action this season. It’s a victim of not having enough players despite the cooperative agreement between schools in the eastern half of the county. The schools will try to rebuild the football program by participating in the junior varsity and junior high levels. The possible expansion of a sports and activities co-op between Carlton and Wrenshall came to a halt this month, after the Wrenshall school board balked at the 13-page agreement approved by Carlton. “Th...
A quiet summer for the Esko Public Schools has allowed administrators and school board members to move forward with plans for a few school improvement projects that will begin construction during the 2022-23 school year. The Esko school board approved the district’s contract with Minneapolis-based ICS, the construction company the district has used in the past, for the construction of a new fitness center and to complete the new water treatment system. Superintendent Aaron Fisher said these p...
Cloquet will, once again, be the place to go to celebrate Labor Day. After a pandemic hiatus, the Oldtimers Banquet will return on Sunday, Sept. 4 from noon to 4 p.m. at the Four Seasons Event Center in Carlton. The parade will return, marching down Cloquet Avenue at 11 a.m., Monday, Sept. 5, followed by children’s activities and food trucks at Veterans Park until 4 p.m. The Northeastern Hotel, Saloon and Grille will host its annual Labor Day car show. They’re hoping for better weather and a better turnout than July Fourth brought. Labor Day...
Sidewalks won this week. So did public health and our sense of community. We congratulate the Cloquet City Council on its unanimous vote in favor of sidewalks — and for following the city’s own rules requiring sidewalks in new subdivisions. Unfortunately, the council hasn’t always voted for sidewalks, something the Cloquet Planning Commission pointed out when its members suggested the council had set a precedent by not requiring sidewalks for some recent projects. It was a reasonable suggestion, but we are thrilled the council threw that argum... Full story
Before You Die you should read “Moby Dick.” A lot of us from varying generations will have had this title as Required Reading in high school or as an undergrad student. I remember trying to plow through it in ninth grade, as the assignment of Ms. Swanson after sprinting through “Huck Finn” and finding it infinitely less interesting than what 5-years-older Jeff Kapinski was buying my eventual wife and Ever-Ever Girlfriend for a birthday present. “I guess it’d be okay if you bought me skis and a... Full story
Patriotism, a viewpoint: The vast majority of this country’s “Greatest Generation” were patriots first and politicos second. They put country before politics. There were both conservatives and progressives who espoused their particular political viewpoints on what should happen via the politicians as far as providing for the general populace. But, they worked together in the U.S. Congress to move this country forward. Yes, many compromises were made on both “sides” of the aisle. And we made progress. No matter our individual conservat... Full story
Thousands of people descended on Cloquet's Veterans Park on Saturday to enjoy music mixed with prayer and plenty of fun as the Wood City Worship Festival kicked off its eighth event in the past nine years. Lee Harris, who organizes the annual event as part of the Kingdom Builders Ministry group, was thrilled with the turnout. Although it hadn't quite reached pre-pandemic levels by late Saturday afternoon, he predicted even more people would arrive for headliner Cory Asbury that night. Harris sai...
Bryan "Bear" Bosto surveyed a sunlit field outside the Fond du Lac Ojibwe School last week, and spoke with pride. "We have a lot of Native talent in this game," said Bosto, organizer of the Lax-4-Life summer lacrosse camp. Lacrosse nets lined a field divided into playing areas for both younger and older boys and one for girls. Bosto noted 32 children from six regional tribes taking part in the weeklong camp – a celebration of lacrosse and the Native American cultures from which the game sprang c... Full story
The hockey journey of former Lumberjack Jamie Langenbrunner continued this past week when it was announced he is the new assistant general manager of the Boston Bruins. Langenbrunner starred for the Cloquet hockey team in the early 1990s and went on to an 18-year professional career. He played for the Dallas Stars, the New Jersey Devils and the St. Louis Blues. During his professional career, Langenbrunner won the Stanley Cup twice, and also played for the U.S. Olympic team twice, and was team... Full story
Cloquet and Carlton County have an impressive history of producing their own “legends,” but we’ve also imported some of our talent. Starting as far back as the sawmills, regional employers — including the schools, manufacturing facilities and the public sector — were known to recruit talented employees from across the country, and some of them could play ball. This story is about Bill Powell, now in his 90s and living in Connecticut, a Northwest Paper mill recruit in the 1950s. Powell grew up in... Full story
The mystery may have been solved. On Monday, Aug. 15, pharmacies across Carlton County were having an unexplained surge in sales of Bengay, ice packs, and Ace bandages. The reason may have been those seeking recovery help from the old-timers' game played by the 1972 Blackhoof Valley Men's Fastpitch Softball team. Fifty years ago, the team went 18-0 in the Carlton County 10-team league, and they were reunited recently to remember days of old and see if they could still hit, run, and field. The... Full story
I am looking forward to attending the Finnish luncheon Tuesday, Sept. 20, at noon at the Kettle River senior center and seeing what we will have then — maybe another reading on the area’s history. This is always a great time to visit with friends we see only once a month. The last Finnish luncheon for the season will be Oct. 18. When I was young, my next-door neighbor had an ice box. The iceman would bring her blocks of ice every day. During the hot summer days, all the neighborhood kids would anxiously wait for him to stop in front of our hou...
I was fortunate enough to attend the memorial service for former pastor Ed Nieman at Faith Lutheran Church in Coon Rapids Friday, Aug. 12. The service was beautiful, the church even more beautiful. Ed and Gayle’s daughters, Jenifer and Rhea, presented a PowerPoint tribute highlighting their years with their dad as children and his many volunteer projects during his years in the ministry and after retiring. What a wonderful husband, father, brother, uncle, grandfather, pastor, and friend to so m...
High school students from across the state were invited to present food security research findings and participate in the Minnesota Youth Institute on May 16, an educational program hosted by the University of Minnesota’s College of Food, Agricultural and Natural Resource Sciences and the World Food Prize Foundation. Barnum students Jasmine Akurgo, Brenan Class, Samuel Collier, Henry Dammer, Brooke Doran, Amri Gilbertson, Kailey Halverson, Hudson Kasberg, Rayna Klejeski, Lacie O’Leary, Reese Miletich, Max Moors, Joe Peterson, Lilly Pettit, Kay...
