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
Sorted by date Results 176 - 200 of 305
The Wrenshall school district is moving ahead with plans to update a moldering building on its campus into a space for industrial and technology classrooms. The school board approved a plan Monday that requires $3.1 million to shore up the former rec building, money that would likely come from a non-voter-approved levy. This is adding to the $9.3 million nonvoter-approved levy the board passed in early 2020 to cover projects that are now being completed at the school. The district is allowed to... Full story
Her voice has a certain gravitas to it, then at turns it is lifted by a whimsical lilt driving a hearty laugh. Free as a kid's laugh, really. It is her 80th birthday, and a party has sprung up near Scott's Corner south of Carlton. She is flitting around, getting this and that ready. She earnestly thanks everyone who arrives, with theatrical gestures as further exclamation. She dings around on her electric keyboard, playing along with the alphorn player set up under one of the tents. That whimsy...
Several building projects around Cloquet are being noticed after the ebbing Covid-19 pandemic shut many projects down due to a shortage of materials in the past year. The Pine Knot News talked to a few business owners and representatives about their projects. If your businesses has similar new, moving or expanding news, send your information to PKN reporters at [email protected]. Dance studio The building at 1404 Cloquet Ave. has lost its round roofline, a vestige of its original use as a...
We are beginning to see some of the longer-term effects of the Covid-19 pandemic as life returns to normal. For many, the more precise term could be "new normal," because things are nothing like they were before the world basically shut down 16 months ago. That's especially true in the regional labor market, where a shortage of workers has many businesses struggling to get help as customers flock back to venues outside of their homes. The literal signs are everywhere, most notably in the...
Consolidation between the Carlton and Wrenshall school districts is no longer on pause. It's dead. The Carlton school board on Monday voted to remove consolidation from its list of future options for the foundering district. Left on the list are two expensive options for district residents: turning the South Terrace elementary into a preK-8 school and releasing high schoolers to another district, or creating a new preK-12 school at South Terrace. While the Carlton board plans to conduct a...
While it’s never an exact science when setting a budget nearly three months before students enter buildings for a new school year, the Cloquet school board approved numbers it was presented with at its regular meeting Monday night. The total operating cost for the 2021-2022 year was estimated at $38.7 million, slightly under proposed revenues. That leaves the district fund balance at $9.2 million, about $86,000 more than the previous budget year. The only eye-opener in the numbers is the projected $385,262 hit to the general fund balance. S...
Attention, potential lifeguards: Preteens will soon be begging you to apply for a job at The Beach at Pinehurst Park this summer. That's because a staff shortage is requiring a major change in beach rules as it prepares to open Monday: All children age 12 and under will be required to wear a lifejacket while in the water. Cloquet Community Ed director Erin Bates said the rule "applies to all, whether or not they have had swim lessons in the past." If staffing levels ramp up, the rules may be... Full story
The uproar at the Streetcar in Carlton late Friday afternoon was not sustained. There were those who specifically came to watch Sam Kavanaugh in the last game of the Jeopardy! Tournament of Champions final, like the family friends in the back room. There were those who were reminded by the venerable game show airing on all of the multiple televisions that a local kid was doing pretty good, again, on the quiz show. Some chanced into it and caught on, at the bar for food and drink in an early... Full story
Sam Kavanaugh was watching himself on Jeopardy! Monday night and it felt foreign to him. While that can be expected for a show that was taped two months ago, it's Kavanaugh's whirlwind success in the game show's "Tournament of Champions" that has him grasping for details of his experience. He won Monday, placing him among the overall top three contestants in the final round airing Thursday and today to determine a champion. "It's bizarre," the 2009 Carlton High School graduate said Tuesday... Full story
The Cloquet school board is whittling away at changing a new normal into just plain normal after an entire school year under the Covid-19 pandemic protocols. On Monday, board members agreed that masking mandates in district buildings would be lifted by the end of June, mirroring a loosening of protective measures sparked by state and national guidance as the threat of Covid-19 has ebbed. Superintendent Michael Cary said current recommendations call for masks to be worn in school buildings only during the school day. He said it would make sense...
The video is amazing. The reaction from Barnum High School sophomores Kate Ferrin and Ava Gran tells you all you need to know about how big a deal it was to find out last weekend that they are national champions. "We got first in nationals," Gran breathlessly says in an exhilarating reaction recorded online as news came May 8 that the team's national Business Professionals of America (BPA) project was deemed the best in the country. Days later, Gran was still in a daze. "It's crazy. It's...
The Carlton school board agreed this week to move forward with a survey of district residents on a list of options for the future of the district. The survey will come after attempts to consolidate with neighboring district Wrenshall have stalled on issues around debt sharing and the fact that a state bill that would provide financial assistance remains in limbo. In a 6-0 vote at its regular monthly meeting Monday, the Carlton board agreed to begin gathering information for a survey that will...
The Wrenshall school board approved a major administrative shift for the district Wednesday night in a special meeting. The move was precipitated by superintendent Kim Belcastro’s request to reduce her duties by nearly half, primarily giving up dual work as the school principal. The board approved moving Belcastro to a 0.6 superintendent position and hiring a full-time principal. It will eliminate a dean position. Overall, the district expects to save a few thousand dollars with the changes. Belcastro’s current salary would shift to about $72...
The erroneous property tax evaluation monster has struck again, and this time the bite is big. Two decisions in March, in favor of Enbridge and its pipeline that cuts across the state, in Minnesota Tax Court mean that Carlton County will need to find about $1 million to return to the utility. There have been several such corrections in evaluations for utilities in the past few years, but the decisions last month, which cover how Enbridge property was valued and subsequently taxed for for five years beginning in 2012, is a hit that eclipses all...
Political flags flying in Scanlon underneath an American flag have caused a lot of consternation in the community. At the corner of 22nd Street and Doddridge Avenue, which runs along the border between Scanlon and Cloquet, is a tall flagpole next to a home. It has three flags. At top is the American flag, second is a "Trump 2024" flag stating "F*ck your feelings," and third is a flag that says "F*ck Biden" and "F*ck you for voting for him." The Pine Knot News chose to not explicitly spell out...
For a year I've been begging Stockholm syndrome to kick in. To get used to the Covid-19 pandemic holding us hostage. Find a groove and take it through the murky tunnel. Find that a world turned upside down isn't so bad after all. Maybe even miss it once it ends. Fat chance. If you are like me, and many people I've spoken to in the past few weeks, the light at the end of this tunnel - shown with more access to vaccinations and tumbling case rates - is reason for hope. But I am tired. Drained.... Full story
It's always hit and miss when it comes to hosting motorcycle ice racing on the St. Louis River in Scanlon. But the mid-February cold snap allowed Jeff Berg to rally racers online for an event last Saturday, Feb. 20, near the River Inn. Berg has had three river runs since 2013. It all depends on the weather, he said, especially when it comes to the river. It's a chance for Berg to show off his Iceberg Tires products based out of Superior, where regular ice races take place as part of the Midwest... Full story
The Minnesota Supreme Court ruled earlier this month that the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency was justified in arguing that pollution seeping into groundwater from the Minntac mine tailing basin in Mountain Iron has harmed federally protected waters. The court sided with the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, which appealed a 2019 court of appeals decision that said the MPCA failed in interpreting water rules in a 2018 permit for the U.S. Steel iron ore mine and pellet plant. The...
The on-again, off-again talks between the Carlton and Wrenshall school districts regarding consolidation are officially off again. Superintendents and school board members agreed last week that it was time for a “pause” in current negotiations regarding a merger that has been kicked around for more than a half-century. The pause marks an end to a flurry of consolidation maneuvers in the past two years that saw the school boards agreeing on a two-site plan that would utilize the South Ter...
Jana and I were doing the math. It’s a common game to play after the awards ceremony at the annual convention that draws newspaper people in from across the state each January. We win this, enter that, carry the one … we could have a trophy. Someday. That’s what we kicked around last year after the ceremony that was part of the last in-person convention we can expect for a while. Each year, the Minnesota Newspaper Association hosts what it calls the “Better Newspaper Contest.” Newspapers large and small submit entries of the best writing,... Full story
"You're grounded." That's what Judy Proulx told her 60-something son last week when the thermometer he had purchased for her went on the blink. The impish gesture defined Jim Proulx's mother. "I'm grounded for life," Jim said. He delivered a wistful laugh Wednesday because that joking exchange became the last between the mother and son. Judy died on Jan. 11. A few hours later, her husband since 1959, Jim, also died. "Romantic?" son Jim wondered from his winter home in Yuma, Arizona, where his... Full story
At the start, it was as if no one really knew how or whether to panic. So they cleared shelves of toilet paper and anything that could be used to kill germs on surfaces. As the state ordered places to shut down in order to quell the spread of Covid-19, it continued to only slowly seep in just how radically things might change in a pandemic world. Adam Bailey, owner of Cloquet bar The Jack, was like anyone else trying to navigate just what was happening. "Uneasy," he told the Pine Knot News in...
It was a cold morning at the edge of the Old Holy Family Cemetery. This is where LeRoy DeFoe was put to rest on Dec. 28. It's important to note that fact, since DeFoe spent many years discovering long-forgotten gravesites and cemeteries on the Fond du Lac Reservation. DeFoe died Dec. 20, a day after his 72nd birthday and just a few months after a cancer diagnosis. "It was an honor knowing him," said Christine Carlson, who regarded him as a historical "cohort" when it came to preserving the... Full story
A fly on the wall at the office of the Pine Knot News, during a meeting of the minds discussing year-in-review stories, may not have contained itself in screaming: "Covid. Done." But, being a fly with no means to discernibly communicate with humans, no one here at the office heard the plea. Not that we needed to. 2020. Covid. Pandemic. Restricted socializing. Masks. Illness. Death. Loss. Or, as we displayed in our largest headline of the year on March 20: Everything has changed. Yes, fly, 2020...
Gene Shank most often got up before his wife, Linda, did. She had allergies, and at night it could keep her from getting to sleep right away. Gene would let the dogs outside at their home next to the Moose Horn River in Barnum. He'd putz around, get on his computer. It was the "normal life of retired people," he said. Linda was a loud snorer - "she rattled the windows" - and he relied on that rumbling to know she was at least getting her sleep. By mid-morning, he'd start preparing the stinging... Full story
