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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Cloquet school board members voted unanimously Monday to continue livestreaming meetings on the district YouTube page for citizens to watch during or between meetings. Superintendent Michael Cary said he has objected “a little bit” to livestreaming in the past, because he liked the board meetings to be more participatory. Not any more. “I've gotten to a point where I feel if people have something they really want to say directly to the board they do show up,” he said. “And so I have heard enough positive things from community members about bei...
The Cloquet girls softball team is playing its best ball of the season, and just in time for playoffs. Cloquet beat North Branch 7-2 at Braun Park last Thursday, May 19. The win was a sweet one for the Lumberjacks, as the Vikings are the defending Section 7AAA champs. Head coach Tyler Korby called it a "statement win." "The girls executed our philosophy really well. We like to play small ball and run and put pressure on teams," Korby said. "We have some kids who can really book; they just kept...
The St. Louis River hit flood stage last weekend, quietly flowing over its banks at Scanlon before violently erupting through the Minnesota Power dam at Thomson/Carlton in dramatic fashion downstream. According to the National Weather Service, the river was expected to crest at 11 feet, 6 inches in Scanlon just after midnight Saturday, before falling below flood stage (10 feet, 6 inches) by early Wednesday, May 18. The weather service called it "moderate" flooding. Marcie Stohlberg, who owns...
Duluth musician Gaelynn Lea not only performed for the entire student body at Washington Elementary last Thursday, she had a conversation with them: 250 students at a time in two sessions. "How many of you have ever been in a really bad mood and cranked up the radio and danced around the house, maybe punched the air a few times?" she asked. "How many of you have been in a really good mood and danced around the house for that reason? And how many have ever felt anxious or scared and put on some...
Nearly two dozen people attended Monday's Wrenshall school board meeting, none of them to address agenda items. Four people spoke; two others belatedly said they wanted to give their time to the first speaker. That was Tony Sheda, a frequent speaker at Wrenshall school board meetings. The longtime resident repeated a litany of past complaints to the board, starting with the assertion that a petition that led to the removal of a board-appointed member, Bill Dian, last September was illegal....
Jury selection started Monday, May 16, in the long-awaited homicide trial of 35-year-old Sheldon Thompson, with the trial expected to last into early June. Thompson is accused of killing his pregnant girlfriend, Jackie Defoe, her unborn child, and her 20-month-old son in March 2020. Thompson faces two charges of murder in the first degree each for the deaths of Jackie Ann Defoe and her son Kevin Lee Shabaiash Jr., and one charge of murder in the first degree of an unborn child, premeditated. He also faces two charges of murder in the second deg...
What's the secret to getting into Harvard? Finding and following your passion, said Cloquet High School senior Harmony Fisher. Which, in her case, is birds. It is a "random" fascination she owes to her little brother. "It's kind of random, but Oliver was super interested in birds and he got me hooked," she said. "Now he's not so interested, but I'd like to get a Ph.D. in ornithology." Of course, it also helps to have a 4.0 grade point average, an ACT score of 35, a wide variety of activities...
Cloquet Area Fire District firefighters lost more than an arson detection dog when K-9 Wish was euthanized Monday, they lost a friend. A mix of golden retriever and Labrador, Wish had been with the fire district and her handler, Jason Maki, for nine years. She and Maki were certified on May 9, 2013, and she served enthusiastically - nosing out arson cases - until recently, when her health began to fail unexpectedly. She was diagnosed with advanced cancer and died Monday, exactly nine years from...
Cloquet school district officials have some challenges on their hands in planning for the next few school years, thanks to a “bubble” of large classes that will be entering the high school and continued fluctuations in enrollment likely caused by the pandemic, according to superintendent Michael Cary. During Monday’s Cloquet school board meeting, Cary presented the board with proposals for budget changes in the 2022-23 budget year, which begins in July. In total, district staff are recom...
Duluth musician Gaelynn Lea shares both her music and her musical journey with Churchill Elementary School fourth-grade students Tuesday. Lea visited Churchill on Tuesday and Washington Elementary in Cloquet on Thursday as part of YourClassical MPR's Class Notes program. Class Notes artists are professional musicians who visit elementary and middle schools not only to perform but to also discuss music, composers and instruments. Read all about it in next week's Pine Knot News...
While gray days dominated the month of April outside, art students at Cloquet Middle School were creating a scene of spectacular color and warmth inside a second floor hallway. Their new mural measures 9 feet high and 30 feet long, and features two young people working in a garden, lots of flowers, bees, and butterflies. Like a garden, the mural wasn't created overnight. First, the students learned about bees and pollinators from the NE Minnesota Beekeepers Association, then about food...
Prior to winning the state championship last Wednesday, April 27, members of the Cloquet High School Econ Team ran past cheering crowds in the hallways of the high school ... dressed in two-piece suits and carrying giant binders filled with study guides. The school did everything it normally does for a sports team bound for state, even providing a police escort (school officer Elijah Haglund, who jogged down the hallways behind them). Then the team got down to business, pulling up chairs around...
Cloquet city councilors took a step toward purchasing body-worn cameras and new stun guns by voting to accept a $38,000 grant Tuesday night, but acknowledged if they go through with the purchase, it will mean significant expense to the city and its taxpayers. If approved, the estimated cost of a package deal for body-worn cameras — which the department doesn’t have — and new stun guns to replace the almost obsolete equipment used now, is more than $205,000 over five years, with the grant money included. At the end of the five years, the depar...
Nearly 700 people turned out Sunday morning for Harold's Flippin' Flapjack Fiasco, which raised close to $9,000 for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in its 10th year. On Tuesday, event founder Harold Ankrum said money is still coming in, after a supporter stopped by Harold's Service in Carlton to donate $100 to the cause. Ankrum said people like to support St. Jude's cancer research, but they also like the pancakes. "A lot of it is J.J.'s Family Tradition pancakes recipe," Ankrum said of...
Considering a run for political office? The filing period for state and local offices — only those that could require primary elections in August — will be open May 17-31. The city of Cloquet has four positions up for election in November, including the mayor and council seats for Wards 1, 2 and 3. All are four-year positions. Carlton County also has a number of positions up for election this year, including county commissioners for District 2 (Thomson Township area) and District 4 (including the Wrenshall, Carlton and Mahtowa area and parts of...
The latest Cloquet High School spring play is literally magical ... and will look familiar if you're a Harry Potter fan. But don't expect that name to come up. Sure, there is a person referred to as "Harry," or "Potter," but he's not the star of the show. Rather, this play is about a certain famous fictional school of magic, but the focus is on the Hufflepuffs, who just happened to be there too. "Puffs, or Seven Increasingly Eventful Years at a Certain School of Magic and Magic" is a 2015...
City administrator Tim Peterson announced Cloquet has earned Tree City status once again, recognition that the city makes the planting and care of trees a priority. It had been more than a decade since Cloquet was officially declared a Tree City. City staff worked with the Arbor Day Foundation to meet requirements the past year. “It quite honestly takes a whole lot of work to get it set up initially, and Caleb and his staff took that on,” he said, referring to public works director Caleb Pet...
The censure hearings against Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa chairman Kevin Dupuis ended Monday with a meeting of the Reservation Business Committee. In a meeting open to band members in person and online, the RBC voted 3-2 that the accused chairman answered the questions to the council’s satisfaction. There will be no further proceedings, stated the band’s chief judge, Henry Buffalo, who was the presiding official for the hearing. Fond du Lac secretary/treasurer Ferdinand Martineau originally made the motion to censure Dupuis at...
Attorneys and Sixth District judge Jill Eichenwald hammered out the rules of engagement for the murder trial of Sheldon Thompson, on the Carlton County Court calendar from mid-May through June 3. More than two years have passed since Thompson was arrested in March 2020 on suspicion of murdering his pregnant girlfriend and her toddler son. Thompson, 34, is accused of killing Jackie Defoe, her unborn child, and her 20-month-old son in March 2020. Thompson faces two charges of murder in the first degree each for the deaths of Jackie Ann Defoe and...
It's a task that's loomed large since Erin Bates took over as Cloquet Community Education director almost 18 months ago: find a new home for Li'l Lumberjacks Learning Center. Mission accomplished. In September, Li'l Lumberjacks and the entire Kids Corner program will move into a new facility at Pine Tree Plaza - most recently a furniture store - after extensive renovations inside. "We needed to relocate Li'l Lumberjacks, it was either that or potentially close the program," Cloquet...
Just over a month after Esko schools had to evacuate due to a bomb threat, the same thing happened in Cloquet on Wednesday, April 20. Cloquet police chief Derek Randall told the Pine Knot that the Cloquet High School call was "exactly the same script" as the Esko call on March 17, including allegations of a backpack with wires being left in a particular classroom. The FBI confirmed afterward that the call to Esko - and numerous other schools in Wisconsin, Louisiana and California on March 17 -...
While it lacked the visual excitement of scores of children running around picking up brightly colored eggs like tiny vacuum cleaners, Saturday's Skate with the Easter Bunny event was a hit with kids and parents. Everyone could skate for free indoors, with music blaring and the Easter Bunny and the Lumberjacks mascot both hitting the ice. In the lobby there was popcorn, face painting and Easter crowns to be colored. Although there were no plastic Easter eggs in sight, every child could grab a...
Cloquet city councilors voted unanimously Tuesday to approve the condemnation of the building that once housed Mexico Lindo, a three-story building at 915 Cloquet Ave. originally constructed as the Hotel Solem in 1921. The vote came after two years of attempts by the city to get the property owners to make repairs, after building official Matt Munter found numerous issues including a leaky roof and bulging brick walls. The city got no response from the owners to multiple orders to repair until...
Carlton resident Galyna Tuttle didn't cry when she told the story of the young boy who bled to death in her native country of Ukraine, because she's all cried out after hearing and reading and talking about the horrors of war. Tuttle doesn't live there anymore; she moved to the United States with her husband, Andrew, 16 years ago. She's still shocked that there is even war in her country, and that shock has been multiplied many times by what has happened since Russia invaded. It's a world away...
For those wondering how Carmen Purcell has fared in her mission to aid or rescue a Ukrainian teenager she considers a member of the family, things are moving in the right direction. When the Pine Knot News last wrote about Carmen and Craig Purcell and their fears for Sonia, a 14-year-old they hosted here in Minnesota when she was 9, Sonia and her parents were living in a town occupied by Russians, but not under direct attack. That was March 4, eight days after the war began. (See "Family has dee...
