Tag Archives: business

Aerial view of West Duluth, 1970

Posted on by
2

Circa 1970

This News Tribune file photo shows Interstate 35 under construction through West Duluth. It has two dates written on the back – 1969 and 1970 – so perhaps an alert reader can pick out some details from this image to determine which year is correct.

This photo certainly shows how important Cody Street was as an entrance to Duluth before the freeway was completed.

Click on the photo for a much larger version of the image. Here are a couple of zoomed-in views, starting with the West Duluth commercial district (this was a time before Kmart and Super One):

And here’s the area around Laura MacArthur School, what was then Shoppers City and the long-gone railroad viaduct:

Here are links to a couple of past Attic posts on West Duluth:

West Duluth, early 1980s

West Duluth before the paper mill, 1986

What interesting things do you spot in these photos? Share your observations and memories by posting a comment.

Downtown Duluth’s Sunnyside Cafe, 1981

Posted on by
5

October 13, 1981

Here’s a story from the Duluth Herald files from 1981, profiling an old-fashioned downtown Duluth cafe and its proprietors. It’s kind of a long article, but it’s a pretty fun, charming story with some memorable anecdotes. Enjoy…

Art Rode mans the counter at the Sunnyside Cafe in downtown Duluth in October 1981. (Joey McLeister / Duluth Herald)

Cafe owners keep their Sunnyside up

By Lynnell Mickelsen, Duluth Herald

At 6:15 a.m. there are four regulars in the cafe, people who drove past McDonald’s, Burger King, Hardee’s, Sambos and the 7-11 to get to this place. The waiter knows their names and their orders. He also knows their fishing stories, hunting stories, idiot boss stories and their political views. The cook knows all of this plus their dietary restrictions. This morning she tells a regular she will boil his eggs instead of fry them because his doctor has repeatedly told him to lose weight. “It will save you 55 calories,” she says.

The Sunnyside Cafe, 214 E. Superior St., has nine stools, four booths, no chrome and no cute names on the menu. It’s open Monday through Friday from 6 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Owners Art and Marion Rode are also the waiters, cooks, dishwashers, busboys, buyers and bookkeepers. They have been in the restaurant business for nearly 40 years.

They have, in other words, a 30-year jump on Egg McMuffins, which came out in 1972 and sparked the Great Breakfast War among the fast-food franchises. McDonald’s, Hardee’s, Sambos and the others compete fiercely among themselves for the breakfast crowd. They can deliver the food faster and cheaper than the Rodes, although this suggestion raises a chorus of protest from Sunnyside regulars.

“They can’t give you ham that comes off the hog,” says one.

“They fire the waitresses so often … they don’t know what the hell they’re doing and it takes forever,” says another.

“They don’t even know what hash browns are,” says another.

Even so, the franchises seem to be winning and the Rodes’ nine-stool cafe and other ma and pa operations appear to be a fading phenomenon, dying off by attrition, because no businessman in his right mind would try to start one now.

Marion Rode, a cook with more nearly 40 years of experience, wraps up a sandwich to go at the Sunnyside Cafe in October 1981. Five days a week from this window, she watches the sunrise over Lake Superior. (Joey McLeister / Duluth Herald)

The Rodes, however, don’t think about the future of breakfast cafes. For one thing, they have to get up too early to be philosophical. They arrives at the cafe at 5:15 a.m. in order to have coffee ready and the stove hot for people who, either by neurosis or necessity, east breakfast at 6. They have risen so early for so long that even on weekends, back home in Duluth Heights, they are often up at 5 a.m., drinking coffee.

Getting up early is hardly glamorous, but it has its compensations. The cafe’s back kitchen window looks out over Lake Superior and, over the years, the Rodes have watched one superb sunrise after another.

“We watch it move with the season,” Marion says, cracking two eggs into a cast-iron frying pan. The sunrise moves from the left side of the window across to the right and, for three weeks in December, disappears behind the wall of the Muffler Clinic before emerging and switching directions. They watch the storms brew up over the lake and, in the winter, they say the spray from the surf nearly hits the window.

At 6:30 a.m., a regular, his limbs shortened by dwarfism, swaggers into the cafe. Before the man is two feet inside, Art orders a cheese sandwich to go and Marion is reaching for the bread. Art and the man banter over the counter.

“He’s always giving me grief,” the man says to another customer as Art walks back to the kitchen. “Someday I’m going step on him.”

“What’s that?” Art asks, coming back.

“You’re always giving me grief,” the man repeats happily.

“Bacon and eggs,” Art calls into the kitchen. Another regular has just walked in. Art has been serving breakfast to some people for 20 years, watching them go from scrawny to paunchy. Marion remembers changing the diapers on a man. (“I don’t bring it up because it would embarrass him to tears.”) Regulars need to order only if they are feeling talkative; otherwise, Art can do it automatically.

It’s one of the few automatic processes in the place. Outside of an electric mixer and the cafe’s technological hub, a Bunnomatic coffee maker, this is a restaurant devoid of gizmos and shortcuts. There is no microwave. No pastry steamers. No Cuisanart. No dishwasher. Two years ago they unplugged the Hamilton Beach blender because it was too distracting.

As Art points out, it came down to a matter of priorities: by the time he made someone a milkshake, he could have served three people meatloaf.

“That machine,” Art says, pointing to the forsaken mixer, still sitting on the shelf, “kept us from doing the work we were meant to do.”

A close-up view of the Sunnyside Cafe menu from the photo above. Click on the photo for a larger view.

The same spirit carries over to the kitchen. “Nothing here is artificial,” Marion declares. In the fall, they bring in apples from the tree in their back yard and make pies.

Marion got her start in the restaurant business in 1942, in a place where the Radisson now stands. It was during the war, the shipyards were busy and they served 1,000 people a day. She made $14 a week and worked with a crew of veteran cooks. “Real old-timers,” she says. “I mean, they were purists. One lady used to save up lard and make the soap herself.”

Marion saved her money, and after the war started a place of her own. Art was one of her customers. “I was hard-boiled then,” she says. “One day I was throwing a drunk out of the place and he landed on Art.”

Art was out of the service, working at the Duluth airport. He had no known aspirations for the restaurant business until the drunk fell on him and he fell for Marion. But he has taken to it well. A smooth breakfast-bartender, he pours coffee with an instinctive, generous hand. A well-informed man, he doesn’t read the newspaper because, by noon, the entire paper has usually been read aloud to him, interspersed with editorial comment and unpublished details. He knew by 6:15 a.m. that Egypt’s Anwar Sadat had been shot.

Art comes back into the kitchen. He and Marion are trying unsuccessfully to remember the last names of veteran customers. The highest price on the menu is $2.95 and people don’t write checks. The only last names they know are for the doctors at the medical center who apparently never had first names.

The Rodes ran a cafe in the 500 block of West Superior Street in downtown Duluth for many years before urban renewal forced them out. This photo was taken in about 1954; Art Rode is behind the counter.

Marion glances up at the wall that separates the kitchen from the dining area. Someone’s waiting to pay the bill,” she says.

Art disappears. The cash register rings.

“You get to be able to feel that kind of stuff in your bones,” Marion says, shaping a meatloaf with her hands. She is a well-fed cook, the kind who “never eats” and must diet subsequently. She reads cookbooks “like novels” but doesn’t use them in the kitchen.

“When I was a girl, I wanted to be a research doctor. I wanted to find the cure for cancer. Never got enough education.” She now tests out various theories of the cause of cancer and finds them wanting. For example, she says she served bacon every morning to an attorney who not only did not succumb to cancer, but lived to 95 and died in his bed.

There are five calendars in the kitchen: odd decoration for a woman supposedly without a sense of time. Marion is vague on the years, vague on her age. Art, on the other hand, is 62, and can tell you the deer season starts in “four weeks and two days.” Every year they close for three weeks during deer season, but, by the third week, they are both restless to come back.

They don’t want to retire, but have heard the building will be sold in two years to make space for access across a planned freeway. “Urban renewal,” Art says, shaking his head. The Rodes have never sold quiche lorraine and their restaurants have never survived urban renewal. Urban renewal, according to Art, forced them out of their old restaurant about 12 years ago.

“We could never start up again today. Never. Too many health regulations,” Marion says. She sweeps her arm across the kitchen, pointing at the wooden shelves and countertops. “Now everything has to be stainless steel. Counters and booths have to be so far off the floor. Not that I’m complaining, mind you. You can’t be too careful. Eat off a low counter and it might kill you.”

– end –

The shelves behind the counter in the first photo stocked Snickers, Milky Way and 3 Musketeers candy bars, among other items.

The Sunnyside Cafe closed by the mid-1980s, and a few years later its building was gone. As alluded to in the second-to-last paragraph of the story, it’s now the location of an access point to Lake Place Park, next door to Perry Framing.

Art Rode died in August 2000 at age 80. Marion Rode died in July 2001 at age 89.

Do you remember the Sunnyside Cafe? Share your memories by posting a comment. Direct questions about the Attic to akrueger(at)duluthnews.com.

The bars of North Fifth Street in Superior, 1978

Posted on by
11

October 15, 1978

Bars line the north side of North Fifth Street in Superior on Oct. 15, 1978. (Charles Curtis / News-Tribune)

Does the scene above look familiar? If so, you have a pretty good memory, because all but one of these bars lining North Fifth Street in Superior have been gone for years. The stop sign by the vintage van marks the corner of Ogden Avenue in this view looking east. From left to right, the bars visible here are the Heartbreak Bar, Burke’s Place, the 5th Street Hotel, High Times Saloon, Nickel Street Saloon, the Viking Lounge and the Handlebar. Click on the photo for a much larger image.

This area was largely cleared to make way for commercial and industrial development in the 1970s and 1980s. Here’s the same stretch of North Fifth Street today:

A surviving tavern is the Viking at the corner of Fifth and Hughitt, visible in the distance with the same vertical LIQUORS sign as it had in 1978. Here’s a close-up present-day view:

There may be one other tavern structure still standings – is the “Handlebar” in the distance in the 1978 photo the same building that houses Schultz’s Sports Bar today? I don’t know.

So when did all those bars get torn down? Was it all at once, or did it happen over a few years? Again, I don’t know, so perhaps one of you can fill in some details.

A March 29, 1981, News Tribune article on the redevelopment effort in the North End mentioned how “the project is creating open spaces in the once heavily settled district between Tower and Hammond avenues and North Third and the east-west rail corridor at Eighth Street.

“The 20-square-blocks are being transformed from one of old frame houses ‘so close together neighbors could shake hands through open windows’ to an area of potential high value as a commercial and light industrial district, Superior community development specialist James Kumbera said.”

The city was buying up houses as it could and demolishing them to create large areas of open land.

—-

What are your memories of the bars along North Fifth Street? What more information can you offer about when they were torn down? Share your memories by posting a comment.

120 years ago, ‘handsome and cultured’ Lakeside became part of Duluth

Posted on by
3

This detail from an 1890 map shows part of the village of Lakeside before it became part of the city of Duluth. (2007 file / News Tribune)

The end of one year and beginning of another can be a time of great change, as new laws and ordinances take effect. Such was the case 120 years ago, when the arrival of 1893 meant that the village of Lakeside became part of the city of Duluth.

As 1892 ended and 1893 began, “the new year was whistled in at midnight by all the mills and industries on the bay shore which had steam up,” the News Tribune reported on Jan. 1. There also was “a fusillade of revolver shots on Superior Street,” but police did not arrest the gun owner, “some license being allowed for exaggerated fun on such an occasion.”

And with the shots and whistles echoing around town, Lakeside residents found themselves living in Duluth. The News Tribune marked the annexation of “Duluth’s handsome, prosperous and cultured suburb to the east” in a Jan. 1, 1893, article:

“After about four years existence as a village under the general laws of Minnesota and with special powers since the legislative session of 1891, beautiful Lakeside, loveliest village on Superior’s shores, became at midnight, with the ringing of the new year’s bells, a part of Duluth, the solid and superb. As a bride to the altar, she came with good wishes and in rich attire. There was no formal marriage ceremony at this time, it having been performed by the legislature two years ago, to take effect on this New Year’s day, and by the mere striking of the clock she passed from an independent suburb to an inseparable part of the twinless city. …

Another detail from an 1890 map shows the village of Lakeside before it was annexed into the city of Duluth. (2002 file / News Tribune)

“In two years from today the whole head of the lake on the Minnesota side of the bay will be a single city stretching from Lester river to Fond du Lac, West Duluth coming in next New Year’s say and participating in the general municipal election of February 1894. Thus the several parts of the future great city are beginning to get together, and while congratulating Lakeside on the alliance it has made, it is equally in order to congratulate Duluth on this early exhibition of her magnetic powers. With excellent street car and steam railway service, delightful carriage drives, fine schools and churches, charming houses, beautiful and even romantic scenery, and a cultured, enterprising people, Lakeside is truly a gem of a city — an agate on a rock-bound coast. …

“With the mists of her own beautiful river as a bridal veil, with snow drops and snow drifts as flowers beneath her feet, we salute again the sunrise suburb, now our own, that has ever been a handsome frontispiece to Duluth.”

And so the village of Lakeside became the Lakeside neighborhood, and the city of Duluth took one more step toward consolidating various municipalities into the city we know today.

And, of course, the terms of the annexation agreement between Duluth and Lakeside stipulated that no bars or liquor stores were to be allowed in the neighborhood – and Lakeside remains “dry” to this day.

—–

Now here’s a little New Year’s bonus from the News Tribune of Dec. 31, 1912…

As Duluth prepared for New Year’s Eve 100 years ago, the Bridgeman-Russell dairy announced a special menu of its “velvet ice cream” to accompany celebrations to welcome in 1913. The flavors? Maple mousse, macaroon, bisque, almond, walnut and nesselrud. “Nesselrud” probably was Nesselrode, a mixture of preserved fruits and chopped nuts named after a 19th-century Russian statesman. The Bridgeman-Russell Co. advertised two locations — 13 E. Superior St. and 14-16 W. First St.

Photos of Paul Wellstone in the Northland

Posted on by
1

Thursday, Oct. 25, 2012, marks the 10th anniversary of the plane crash near Eveleth that took the life of U.S. Sen. Paul Wellstone (D-Minn.), his wife Sheila, and six others. Read the News Tribune’s coverage of the anniversary here.

Here’s a selection of News Tribune file photos from Wellstone’s many trips to the Northland, leading up to his election to the Senate in 1990 and in the years that followed:

Democrat Paul Wellstone ratchets up his U.S. Senate campaign against incumbent Republican Rudy Boschwitz during a stop at the Duluth Labor Temple on June 9, 1989. (John Rott / News-Tribune)

—–

Senator-elect Paul Wellstone reacts to the approval of the crowd during a standing-room-only town hall meeting at the Marshall School cafeteria in Duluth on Dec. 5, 1990. (Steve Stearns / News-Tribune)

—–

As Sen. Paul Wellstone jokes with locals at Maggie’s, a popular restaurant in Nashwauk, on April 5, 1991, owner Margaret Breuling looks on and smiles. (Charles Curtis / News-Tribune)

—–

Sen. Paul Wellstone greets people who gathered for the opening of his office in Virginia, Minn., on April 5, 1991. (Charles Curtis / News-Tribune)

—–

Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., speaks at a rally at the Duluth Labor Temple on London Road on April 13, 1991. (Dave Ballard / News-Tribune)

—–

Sen. Paul Wellstone answers questions from the audience during a meeting about health-care issues on Feb. 13, 1992, at Duluth Central High School. (Clara Wu / News-Tribune)

—–

Sen. Paul Wellstone addresses DFL delegates from across Minnesota on June 5, 1992, the first day of the state DFL convention at the DECC, Interpreting was Kim Olson of Minneapolis. (Bob King / News-Tribune)

—–

Marilyn Pribyl of Chaska and Terry Selle of Bloomington listen as Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., pauses to chat with them during a stop at Grandma’s Restaurant in Duluth on Jan. 15, 1994. (Steve Stearns / News-Tribune)

—–

Sen. Paul Wellstone addresses a gathering of people in low-income situations during a news conference Nov. 21, 1995, at Emerson School in Duluth. The event was held to bring attention to the plight of low-income people in need of housing assistance. (Dave Ballard / News-Tribune)

—–

Aimee McIntyre (left) and Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., share a laugh during a rally for Wellstone at the Federal Building in Duluth on July 1, 1996. Supporters wore shirts with red targets and the words: “Proud to be a Republican Target.” (Kathy Strauss / News-Tribune)

—–

Sen. Paul Wellstone speaks to the crowd gathered at a rally at the DECC’s Pioneer Hall in Duluth on the morning of Oct. 23, 1996, as Vice President Al Gore applauds in the background. (Dave Ballard / News-Tribune)

—–

U.S. Sen. Paul Wellstone answers a question from a student in the audience during the Democracy in Action forum April 9, 1999, at the College of St. Scholastica. More than 600 students from the three high schools in Duluth attended the forum, which gave them an opportunity to challenge and ask questions of elected officals. Listening to Wellstone on stage are state Sen. Sam Solon and Duluth Mayor Gary Doty. (Dave Ballard / News-Tribune)

—–

Sen. Paul Wellstone speaks to a crowd of about 100 gathered Sunday at the entrance of ME International in Duluth on Oct. 31, 1999. Wellstone voiced his support of the United Steelworkers of America Local 1028 strike that has been in effect since August. (Renee Knoeber / News-Tribune)

—–

Sen. Paul Wellstone visits Denfeld High School in Duluth on Nov. 16, 2000. (Rick Scibelli / News-Tribune)

—–

Sen. Paul Wellstone meets with a full auditorium of Denfeld High School students on Nov. 16, 2000, at the school. Wellstone took questions and comments from students regarding the recent election and the issues surrounding it. (Rick Scibelli / News-Tribune)

—–

U.S. Sen. Paul Wellstone greets members of the Duluth Denfeld singing groups Solid Gold and Steppin’ Up on Nov. 16, 2000, during a visit to the school. Wellstone engaged the students in a town hall-style meeting, discussing the previous week’s presidential election. (Rick Scibelli / News-Tribune)

—–

Sens. Paul Wellstone and Mark Dayton talk in Superior on March 9, 2001, with employees of Partridge River Inc., the company whose Hoyt Lakes plant was destroyed by fire earlier that month. The meeting took place at Partridge River’s Superior facility. (Charles Curtis / News-Tribune)

—–

Share your memories and stories by posting a comment.

George McGovern in the Twin Ports

Posted on by
1

Former Democratic U.S. Senator and presidential candidate George McGovern of South Dakota died Sunday at age 90.

He made at least two stops in Duluth during his political career, mostly notably on Sept. 8, 1972, during his ultimately unsuccessful presidential campaign against Richard Nixon.

Here are some photos from that visit (and one from 1970). Some of these images from the News Tribune archives had caption information; others did not. If you can fill in any of the gaps or have memories to share, please post a comment:

Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern walks with an entourage of reporters, staff members, security and local officials at the Duluth airport during a visit to the Twin Ports on Sept. 8, 1972. McGovern made a quick campaign stop in the Northland that day, briefly meeting with supporters at the airport before taking a tour of the Farmers Union Grain Terminal Association elevator in Superior, where he donned a hard hat and watched grain being unloaded from a railroad car. Two months later, he lost the 1972 presidential election to Richard Nixon. (News-Tribune file photo)

———————

George McGovern (second from left) is joined by (from left) Rep. Jack LaVoy of Duluth, Bill Walker of Cass Lake (elected official? candidate?) and Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Martin Schreiber at the Duluth airport on McGovern’s visit to Duluth on Sept. 8, 1972. (News-Tribune file photo)

—————————

Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern (left) gets a tour of the Farmers Union Grain Terminal Association elevator in Superior from general manager B.J. Malusky on Sept. 8, 1972. (News-Tribune file photo)

————————————

The scene outside the Farmers Union Grain Terminal Association elevator in Superior during a visit by Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern on Sept. 8, 1972. (News-Tribune file photo)

—————————————

Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern (bottom center) gets a tour of the Farmers Union Grain Terminal Association elevator in Superior on Sept. 8, 1972. (News-Tribune file photo)

————————————–

Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern (second from left) walks from his plane at the Duluth airport on Sept. 8, 1972. At left is Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Martin Schreiber; others are not identified. (News-Tribune file photo)

————————————–

U.S. Sen. George McGovern (left) visits Duluth on April 12, 1970. Joining him in this photo are (from left) Stanley Breen, chairman of the city’s DFL coordinating committee; Rep. John Blatnik of Duluth; and James Glazman, 61st District (DFL?) chairman. (Charles Curtis / News-Tribune)

Superior Street before the I-35 tunnels, 1983

Posted on by
9

Here’s a photo of East Superior Street from Oct. 10, 1983, right before construction of the Interstate 35 tunnels in the vicinity of the Fitger’s Brewery complex and Leif Erikson Park:

Scattered among the many buildings that were demolished for the extension of I-35 eastward from downtown to 26th Avenue East, you can see the buildings that survived – Fitger’s just visible at lower right, the Portland Malt Shoppe, Sir Benedict’s, the Kitchi Gammi Club and more. Click on the photo for a larger view.

Also visible is an odd diagonal street cutting across the lower half of the image. That was one-block-long Washington Avenue, which was mostly swallowed up by the freeway construction:

What perhaps could be called a small nub of Washington Avenue still exists today, angling off First Street at Seventh Avenue East next to Expert Tire, leading to the back alley.

The Expert Tire building, visible at left center above, has an angled edge along Washington Avenue – it retains that shape to this day, though the street that caused it to be built that way has been gone now for more than 25 years.

Here are a couple more views of that area from October 1983. This first shot was taken the same day as the photo above, Oct. 10 (click on the photo for a larger view); all photos with this post were taken by the News Tribune’s Charles Curtis:

And this photo was taken later in the month, on Oct. 25, 1983, looking southwest along Superior Street from in front of Sir Benedict’s as buildings were razed for the pending freeway construction:

Here’s a related past Attic post, on efforts to preserve the Fitger’s Brewery complex as the freeway plans were created: Saving Fitger’s from the wrecking ball

Share your memories by posting a comment.

Superior church’s steeple comes crashing down, 1982

Posted on by
Reply

September 2, 1982

The steeple of St. Stanislaus Catholic Church lies damaged at Birch Avenue and North 14th Street in Superior on Thursday, Sept. 2, 1982. The 38-foot steeple was being lifted from the soon-to-be-demolished church when a crane tipped, sending the steeple crashing to the ground. (Jack Renudlich / News-Tribune)

Steeple falls prey to crane

By Larry Oakes, News-Tribune staff writer (appeared in paper on Sept. 3, 1982)

“My reaction was just plain fright. Everything was coming along beautifully, and all at once it swung and started to crash down through the wiring.”

The exasperated speaker was Sophie Butler, 68, of 24-B Hayes court, Superior. She had come Thursday to St. Stanislaus Catholic Church and School in Superior to pay her last respects to her former church, which is scheduled to be razed.

However, the church’s 38-foot steeple was going to be salvaged for use as a beach house. Butler and her husband, Joe, 68, watched as a crane began lifting the steeple from the building.

The couple, longtime members of the church as Birch Avenue and North 14th Street, were taking snapshots and reminiscing. It was about 10:15 a.m.

Seconds later, the feelings of nostalgia turned to horror when the crane, holding the suspended steeple about 30 feet above the ground, tipped, sending the steeple crashing to the ground.

“He lifted it off and everything seemed OK,” said Max Taubert, 29, of 3310 Minnesota Ave., Duluth. “But it came down kind of fast once it started. There was no stopping it. It only took about four seconds.”

Taubert had wanted to convert the carved, metal-faced steeple into a beach house.

“There was a lot of scurrying around,” said Cliff Anderson, whose company, Anderson Sand& Gravel, will demolish the church. Anderson, of 5565 Arrowhead Road, Duluth, sold the steeple to Taubert, who hired Lakehead Constructors of Superior to remove it.

“The crane either broke through the asphalt or the boom started to bend,” Anderson, 40, said. “It made one hell of a lot of noise,” he said, removing a toothpick from his mouth. “Like steel crashing into brick — one of those sounds you don’t hear too often.”

A construction worker is dwarfed by a twisted crane lying in front of St. Stanislaus Catholic Church at 1414 Birch Ave. in Superior on Sept. 2, 1982. No injuries were reported when the crane tipped over and the steeple crashed to the ground. (Jack Rendulich / News-Tribune)

Witnesses said that as the crane tipped, the boom crashed into the entry of the brick building.

Tim Bernard, 35, of Superior, owner of Lakehead, estimated repair to the crane will run from $25,000 to $30,000. “It will be usable,” Bernard said. “We’ll have to cut the boom and get it off the building. Then it will have to be repaired.”

“I would say the outrigger (a support leg) went into the ground,” he said. “It sure wasn’t the weight.”

Taubert said he will probably be out about $1,000, “mostly for the crane time.”

“I’ve already got more into it than it’s worth,” he said. “I had the option of insuring it before I took it off, but it was $1,000 deductible.”

When the boom toppled, it knocked out some adjacent electric and phone lines, resulting in a power outage in that section of Superior for two hours. Residents were without power in an area bounded by North 12th and Belknap streets on the north and south, and the Soo Line tracks and Catlin Avenue on the east and west, said Dick Kennedy, a Superior Water, Light & Power Co. official. Power was restored by 12:30 p.m., Kennedy said.

Wisconsin Telephone Company representative Kendall Nelson said the accident affected only two phone customers.

The steeple of St. Stanislaus Catholic Church in Superior crashed to the ground after a crane toppled on Sept. 2, 1982. (Jack Rendulich / News-Tribune)

The 67-year-old church currently awaits the wrecking ball. It was closed because of a shortage of priests and teachers in the Superior Diocese, Joe Butler said.

The school was shut down in 1968 because sisters were in short supply and no money was available to hire lay teachers. When the cornerstone was laid in 1915 the church boasted 450 families in its membership. By 1982, that number shrank to 150, according to Joe Butler, who was president of the church council.

“All my life I was in the parish,” Butler recalled, his eyes fixed. “I was baptized here, married here, my mother and father both had funeral services here.

Sophie Butler watched the cleanup operation from a yard across the street. “It’s a weird feeling because we were parishioners for so long.”

Across the street workers had started the lopsided crane and were feeding out cable that was still hooked to the steeple. What was left of the structure snapped and creaked slightly as it settled to the ground.

——

As you may have noted, the steeple-crane accident happened almost exactly 30 years ago, on Sept. 2, 1982. Less than a week later, crews moved ahead with the razing of the main church building. Here are some photos of that:

A wrecking ball crashes into the remainder of St. Stanislaus Catholic Church at 1414 Birch Ave. in Superior on Wednesday, Sept. 8, 1982. (Bob King / News-Tribune)

—–

Florence Bozinski (left), Sandy Anderson (center) and Sandy’s son Wayne, 11, all of Superior, watch as crews demolish St. Stanislaus Catholic Church in Superior on Sept. 8, 1982. (Bob King / News-Tribune)

—–

Cliff Anderson (foreground) and Ron Johnson, both of Duluth, watch as St. Stanislaus Catholic Church in Superior is razed on Sept. 8, 1982. (Bob King / News-Tribune)

—–

Share your memories by posting a comment.

West Duluth before the paper mill, 1986

Posted on by
Reply

The site of the proposed paper mill in West Duluth, south of Interstate 35 and east of Central Avenue, as seen in February 1986. (Charles Curtis / News-Tribune)

This year marks the 25th anniversary of the NewPage paper mill in West Duluth, which opened its doors in 1987 as Lake Superior Paper Industries. To build the plant, a neighborhood of homes in West Duluth was cleared. Here are some views of that lost neighborhood; click on the photos for a larger view.

Another aerial view of the proposed paper mill site in West Duluth, taken in February 1986 after plans for the paper mill were announced but before construction started. (Charles Curtis / News-Tribune)

—-

Stan and Marilyn Wabik fought eviction from their home at 32 N. 53rd Ave. W, on the site of the proposed paper mill. They’re seen here on Feb. 8, 1986. (John Rott / News-Tribune)

—-

The paper mill site in West Duluth with some construction under way on July 22, 1986. Jeno Paulucci’s Chun King plant is visible at lower left, with Interstate 35 at lower right in this view looking south. (Charles Curtis / News-Tribune)

—-

The paper mill site in West Duluth with some construction under way on July 22, 1986. Jeno Paulucci’s Chun King plant is visible at center left, with the Bong Bridge in the distance. (Charles Curtis / News-Tribune)

Share your memories by posting a comment.

Newfangled ‘electronic’ mail, 1976

Posted on by
5

When I’m looking for something on microfilm of old papers, I find a lot of other interesting stories and ads – sometime much more interesting than what I was searching for in the first place.

Here’s one such item. from the Sunday, June 20, 1976, issue of the News-Tribune. It has nothing to do with Duluth specifically, but I found it amusing to see how much times and technology have changed:

Electronic mail eyed

Associated Press

WASHINGTON – The Postal Service is taking the first steps toward establishing an electronic mail system that promises overnight delivery of letters at a price no higher than current rates.

The mail agency has signed a $2.2 million contract with the RCA Corp. to study what alternatives are available to the Postal Service in the area of computerized message systems.

“We know it is technologically feasible to have a national electronic message service. We could do it today,” said Ralph Marcotte, Postal Service project manager for the RCA contract.

“The question we want answered now is whether there is a national market for it,” he said. “The chances are very good that the study will come up with at least one alternative that is economically feasible and that would be accepted by the public.”

Technology exists to use leased lines, facsimile devices, communications satellites and other devices to send messages electronically.

One possible application is for the Postal Service to establish “electronic mail kiosks” at such places as shopping centers. A person could enter a message written in block letters into a machine equipped with optical character readers that could convert the message into digital form.

The message then could be transmitted to a Postal Service receiving unit near the addressee. A computer printout of the message could be delivered with the next day’s mail.

Another possibility is for a business to link its own computer electronically with that of the nearest Postal Service message station. “His computer would talk to our computer and then ours would send the message electronically, Marcotte said.

The message could be received by computer by the addressee or a printout could be delivered conventionally.

“The cost of sending a onepage business document would be as low as a nickel per page, not including any delivery costs,” he said.

Marcotte said the chances appear good for delivering an electronic letter for the same or less than the current 13-cent price of a first-class letter.

One potential problem with electronic mail is that private companies now entering the field of electronic message systems may complain about competition from the government.

Marcotte said systems run by private enterprise ”would tend to go along routes of high profitability and high usage” while the Postal Service would try to serve all areas of the country.

Officials point out that the Postal Service already has a nationwide delivery network, an asset that companies do not have.

An electronic system would enable the Postal Service to save considerable mail handling. The Postal Service now employs about 700,000 workers, nearly 1 per cent of the American labor force, in moving the mail.

Postal officials say another possible advantage to the agency would be that electronic mail could recover business that the Postal Service has been losing in recent years. Use of the mail has been declining, partly because of rising mail rates and partly because of the increasing use of privately owned electronic communications at the expense of the U.S. mail.

The Postal Service could begin offering an electronic mail service ”as soon as three years from now if everything goes right,” Marcotte said.

”We have the obvious option of growing in steps as demand for the service grows. We could start with leased lines and then later go to satellites, for example,” he said.

Marcotte said a possible ”second generation” is for people to buy a ”black box” to receive mail electronically in his own home. This is not feasible yet, he said.

Marcotte said electronic mail ”would be a supplement to the present first-class mail and eventually might be a substitute.” He concedes that this ”would be a rather radical departure from the present postal system. It certainly would change our image.”

– end –

Share your stories and memories by posting a comment.