On this day in 1880, future Duluthian Clyde Wetmore Kelly was born in Chicago. His family then moved to St. Paul, where he spent most of his childhood. He first studied architecture working as a draftsman for the treasury department’s supervising architect in Washington, DC, while taking night classes at George Washington University. He worked…

On this day in 1961, future Duluthian Dennis Anderson sat behind the microphone at the studios of WHIB Radio in Hibbing and broadcast for the first time. The Virginia native was only 17 years old and still a high school senior. Two years later he would break the news to Iron Range listeners that President…

On this day in Duluth in 1915, prohibitionist William E. “Pussyfoot” Johnson arrived in the Zenith City to take part in police raids of saloons in Hibbing and Chisholm. Johnson was a former law enforcement officer and journalist who became a highly controversial figure in the temperance movement that led to Prohibition, admitting to drinking…

On this day in Duluth in 1915, the first of ten blast furnaces at the U.S.S.’s Minnesota Steel Plant in Morgan Park was lit for the first time, beginning a steel-making process that would continue for the next sixty years. At 3:30 that afternoon company officials lit the furnace, and later that evening came the…

On this day on Lake Superior in 1905, a great storm began, known to many as the “Thanksgiving Storm” and, more often, the “Mataafa Storm.” The storm produced hurricane-force winds, and the water on Lake Superior’s western end was so high it drove through Minnesota Point at a spot known as “the barrens” hard enough…

On this day in 1903, Johnny “Blood” McNally—star of the NFL’s Duluth Eskimos and Green Bay Packers—was born in New Richmond, Wisconsin. The real name of the hard-playing, hard-drinking, future NFL hall-of-famer was John Victor McNally. He “would have made Brett Favre seem like an introverted librarian,” as Doug Moe of the Madison, Wisconsin, Capital…

On this day in Duluth in 1888, the second Oneota Elementary School opened at 4420 West First Street. Designed by renowned architect Oliver Traphagen, the school was a three-story Romanesque Revival–style building constructed of red brick featuring a tall square tower and a smaller round tower, both topped with iron finials. The school had six…

On this day in Duluth in 1870, Duluth Hose Company No. 1—the foundation of what would become today’s Duluth Fire Department—was first organized. Foreman E. M. Bloomer, assistant foreman T. H. Pressnell, secretary A. S. Chase, steward James Farrell, and vigilance committee members E. M. Bloomer, L. H. Tenney, and George Spencer led the group,…

On this day in 1859, future Duluthian—and the Zenith City’s longest-serving mayor—Samuel Frisby Snively was born near the town of Greencastle in Pennsylvania. He arrived in Duluth in 1886 to start his career as an attorney. A civic leader, Snively famously built Seven Bridges Road and, as mayor from 1921 to 1939, spearheaded efforts to…

On this day in Duluth in 1905, St. Paul architect Thomas Holyoke inspected the installation of the stone fountain he designed to commemorate Duluth pioneer George C. Stone. Stone (who also had a son of the same name) came to Duluth in 1869 with George Sargent as agents of Jay Cooke and set up Duluth’s…