1870: Duluth’s First Year as a City
The following story—adapted from Tony Dierckins’s Duluth: An Urban Biography (Minnesota Historical Society Press, April 2020)—was first published in the Duluth News Tribune in March, 2020, in celebration of Duluth’s 150th anniversary of first becoming a city on March 6, 1870. ___________ In 1870, its first year as a city, Duluth—destined to become the “Zenith…
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Joshua B. Culver: Duluth’s First Mayor and Leader of “The Ring”
The following story—adapted from Tony Dierckins’s Duluth: An Urban Biography (Minnesota Historical Society Press, April 2020)—was first published in the Duluth News Tribune in March, 2020, in celebration of Duluth’s 150th anniversary of first becoming a city on March 6, 1870. ___________ When Duluth first became a city on March 6, 1870, it stretched roughly…
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How Jay Cooke Resurrected Duluth’s “Lifeless Corpse”
The following story—adapted from Tony Dierckins’s Duluth: An Urban Biography (Minnesota Historical Society Press, April 2020)—was first published in the Duluth News Tribune in February, 2020, in celebration of Duluth’s 150th anniversary of first becoming a city on March 6, 1870. ___________ In 1869 journalist John Trowbridge wrote that “civilization is attracted to the line…
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Duluth’s First Boom—and Bust: 1856–1868
The following story—adapted from Tony Dierckins’s Duluth: An Urban Biography (Minnesota Historical Society Press, April 2020)—was first published in the Duluth News Tribune in February, 2020, in celebration of Duluth’s 150th anniversary of first becoming a city on March 6, 1870. ___________ As 1856 began perhaps no other region in the U.S. stood as poised…
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Support Zenith City Press—
and Get a FREE BOOK!
Like every other small, tourism-dependent business in Duluth, we are struggling as retailers and attractions are shut down while we navigate the pandemic. Book sales drive Zenith City Press, allowing us to provide our free Duluth History Archive and deliver a free “This Day in Duluth” story to you every day. So to encourage sales…
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The Many Birthdays of the Zenith City
The following story—adapted from Tony Dierckins’s Duluth: An Urban Biography (Minnesota Historical Society Press, April 2020)—was first published in the Duluth News Tribune in January, 2020, in celebration of Duluth’s 150th anniversary of first becoming a city on March 6, 1870. ___________ In 1956 every man in Duluth was encouraged to grow a beard—whether or…
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How Duluth became “Duluth”
The following story—adapted from Tony Dierckins’s Duluth: An Urban Biography (Minnesota Historical Society Press, April 2020)—was first published in the Duluth News Tribune in January, 2020, in celebration of Duluth’s 150th anniversary of first becoming a city on March 6, 1870. ___________ By the time the Zenith City first became a city in March, 1870,…
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Help the people who help us research our books
Without the Duluth Public Library’s main branch Reference Department, I would not have become fascinated by Duluth history. I and others would not have been able to gather a tenth of the research we’ve collected with the unique resources maintained by the DPL’s amazing and ever-helpful reference librarians. There simply wouldn’t be any modern history…
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How Duluth handled the 1918 flu epidemic
As Duluth and the rest of the world deals with the corona virus pandemic—and here at Zenith City Press I prepare to cancel or reschedule upcoming events related to Duluth: An Urban Biography—I thought it would be a good time to remind my fellow Duluthians that we have been through something like this before, just…
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