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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A renovated hotel and casino, a new tribal justice center and a cannabis facility near the intersection of Minnesota Highway 210 and Interstate 35 are among the projects in development by the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. The cannabis facility follows the direction of three other tribes - the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe, and Red Lake and White Earth nations - since marijuana was legalized in the state in August 2023. Caleb Dunlap, spokesman for the Fond du Lac Band, declined to...
Although University of Minnesota administrators say the transfer of the Cloquet Forestry Center is essentially a done deal, Carlton County legislators say they won't vote for bills proposed in the Minnesota House and Senate that would support the land transfer to the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. In response to questions posed by the Pine Knot News, Rep. Jeff Dotseth (R-Kettle River) and Sen. Jason Rarick (R-Pine City) both said they would "not support" any measures to move this...
Jason Eckenberg and Adam Swanson walked through the home of Cloquet resident Ed Enlund on a routine home safety visit Monday. The Cloquet Area Fire District firefighter/EMTs took note of which rooms needed smoke alarms, pulled out a ladder, and got to work. "I'd say it improves my living spaces and probably my life - more my life than living spaces," Enlund said. The lifespan of a smoke alarm is about 10 years. The CAFD's home safety visit program and American Red Cross's Home Fire Campaign...
Touted as "the future of indigenous cinema," the Thunder Film Fest offers a free day of indigenous film May 4 at Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College in Cloquet. The day begins with a free breakfast at 9 a.m., followed by an opening ceremony and a sneak peek of an international documentary and Q&A with Ojibwe and Karelian casts until noon. At 1 p.m. is the community showcase, a local short film competition. The recently released documentary film "Bad River" starts at 3 p.m. Chronicling the W...
After weeks of searching, Fond du Lac Reservation Mahnomen neighborhood resident Peter Michael Martin is still considered missing. The 31-year-old Fond du Lac Band member was last seen and heard from March 8. He is described as approximately 5-foot-10, 185 pounds with dark brown eyes. He has a small scar on his forehead and a number of tattoos across his left and right arms, shoulders and chest. Anyone with tips or information on Martin’s whereabouts is asked to call 911, the Fond du Lac Police Department at 218-878-8040, or the St. Louis C...
Animikii Mazina'iganan: Thunderbird Press, with Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College, will celebrate the release of "Fur Trade Nation: An Ojibwe's Graphic History" by renowned artist Carl Gawboy 5-7 p.m. Tuesday, April 30. The well-known artist and Bois Forte Band member uses more than 800 pen and ink drawings, connecting historical records and art, oral traditions, Western and Indigenous scholarship, family history and contemporary artisans, to tell the important story of the fur trade...
The Carlton County board is often audience to presentations on everything from treating invasive spongy moths to what the county's housing needs look like. Recently, the board heard a pair of presentations from local officials: an annual report from the Carlton Soil and Water Conservation District on April 2 at the committee of the whole meeting, and another April 9 about how the county is spending its portion of opioid settlement money. The information-gathering sessions proved fruitful, presen...
The search continues for Peter Michael Martin. The 31-year-old Fond du Lac Band member was last seen and heard from March 8. He is described as approximately 5-foot-10, 185 pounds with dark brown eyes. He has a small scar on his forehead and a number of tattoos across his left and right arms, shoulders and chest. On Monday, April 1, the Fond du Lac Band activated a full Emergency Operations Center process, requiring resources from all divisions across the tribal nation to support the search and rescue efforts for Martin. This allows search effo...
A five-year plan for roughly 64 miles worth of paving and other road and bridge projects was outlined to the Carlton County board on Tuesday. The tentative list of projects presented to the committee of the whole included only a half-mile of roadway reconstruction work this summer, on 22nd Street from Washington to Prospect avenues in Cloquet, along with a number of repavement projects moving forward. The longest stretch, 9 miles of County Road 6 to Barnum, is scheduled for 2028 and will...
Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa members voted on tribal council members Tuesday, April 2, narrowing the field of primary candidates to two each for the general election on June 11. The top two vote getters in each race will advance. Current chairperson Kevin Dupuis Sr. will face Bruce Savage in June. Incumbent Wally Dupuis and challenger Michelle Debolt will face off for the District 1 (Cloquet) seat, and incumbent Roger Smith will face Earl Otis for the District 3 (Brookston) seat. The unofficial vote tallies for chair and district...
Sonya Marie Skoglund, 54, of Cloquet and a proud member of the Fond du Lac Band, passed away March 30, 2024, at Essentia Health-St. Mary's Medical Center in Duluth, surrounded by her loved ones. She was born Sept. 12, 1969, to Clara Northrup and Vernon Skoglund. Sonya grew up on Boulder Lake at the Silver Fox Lodge, where she enjoyed swimming, camping and playing pool in the bar, all while making lifelong friends. Sonya graduated from Duluth Central High School in 1987 and went on to earn two...
Although the weather halted searches this week, Peter Michael Martin remains a missing person. The 31-year-old Fond du Lac Band member was last seen and heard from March 8. He is described as approximately 5-foot-10, 185 pounds with dark brown eyes. He has a small scar on his forehead and a number of tattoos across his left and right arms, shoulders and chest. Anyone with tips or information on Martin’s whereabouts is asked to call 911, the Fond du Lac Police Department at 218-878-8040, or the St. Louis County Sheriff’s Office at 218...
Wearing fluorescent yellow vests and armed with whistles and broomsticks to help them comb through brush and other terrain, volunteers fanned out last week in search of 31-year-old Peter Michael Martin. Martin was last seen and heard from on Friday, March 8. A Fond du Lac Band member who grew up in the Reservation's Mahnomen neighborhood, Martin graduated from Albrook High School in 2011. A news release described Martin as approximately 5-foot-10, 185 pounds with dark brown eyes. He also has a s...
A search was underway Wednesday morning on the Fond du Lac Reservation for a 31-year-old Native American man last seen and heard from on Friday. Peter Michael Martin is considered a missing person, according to a Fond du Lac Band news release. A search and rescue effort began at 9 a.m. Wednesday morning, March 13, using police and volunteers combing the Mahnomen neighborhood. The search-and-rescue effort was being coordinated out of the Brookston Community Center at 8200 Belich Road in Cloquet....
It was nothing but good news coming from the Fond du Lac Resource Management Division last week, as the Band announced a stable moose population, as well as favorable results in a sampling of the local deer herd for chronic wasting disease. The CWD test results, announced on social media, showed the disease was not detected in any of 161 samples provided by the Fond du Lac band and state-licensed hunters or collected roadkill from Minnesota 1837- and 1854-ceded territories and the FDL...
In Carlton County, there are folks who harvest and process the sap that brings us the local flavor of delicious maple syrup, maple sugar, and maple candy we've come to expect each spring. This year - with the frogs already waking up because the weather is warmer heralding an early spring - the trees should be ready to tap. However, the trees are trying to bud in the warmer than usual weather. When asked whether climate change would affect maple syrup products this year, some people say it's...
The path to healthy food systems is a convergence of many tracks beaten by Indigenous elders, ambitious innovators, eager youth, and patient visionaries. Midwest farmers are in the vanguard with gatherings such as the Marbleseed conference, the region’s premier event for organic agriculture, which took place in La Crosse, Wisconsin Feb, 22-24. Over 1,400 people gathered to share ideas and experience. Three speakers at the general session gave new energy to “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.” Ben Hartm...
THUMBS UP to the Moose Lake city council for its unpopular but fiscally responsible decision to contract with Carlton County for its law enforcement needs. The months-long saga ended last week, in what many considered disappointing fashion, with a 3-2 vote. Choosing the Sheriff's Office to provide four deputies and a part-time clerk to cover the city meant dissolving the city's long-standing police force. But the force had dwindled to one, a result of disgruntled officers resigning and early...
Close to 100 people gathered Tuesday to talk about the future of a place they all love, the Cloquet Forestry Center. Although University of Minnesota representatives presented the transfer of the Cloquet Forestry Center to the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa as a mostly done deal - with only the details left to be negotiated - that didn't stop people from sharing their opinions on the proposal. And that was the intent, said Karen Diver, former Fond du Lac tribal chairwoman and now...
The Northland Foundation awarded nearly $2 million in grant funds in the last quarter of 2023 to benefit people and communities in its geographic service area. The lion’s share of grant dollars, $1,175,000, was awarded through the Northland Foundation’s Integrated Rural Community Aging Program. The program provides resources to help three targeted rural sites and three Tribal nations to integrate care coordination, social engagement, and quality of care for older adults, elders, and their caregivers. This is the second three-year phase of thi...
Members of the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa will have plenty of choices in the primary election April 2. Names for three Reservation Business Council positions — Chairperson, District I (Cloquet) Committeeperson and District III (Brookston) Committeeperson — were released Monday. They are listing in alphabetical order below. Candidates for chairperson include James Roy Blacketter III, Kevin R. Dupuis Sr., John A. McMillen, Bruce M. Savage and Victoria (“Vickie”) A. Smith. Dupuis is the incumbent. Candidates for District I include...
It’s been a year since the University of Minnesota made public its administration’s plans to likely give the 3,400-acre Cloquet Forestry Center to the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. Other than a presentation to the university’s Board of Regents by former U of M President Joan Gabel in February 2023, it’s been radio silence since then. Until now. On Monday, university officials announced they’re holding a public listening session 3-4:30 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 13 at the Cloquet Forestry...
Last weekend, as they've done for more generations than there are records, Ojibwe descendents gathered for aadizookeng - wintertime storytelling which can be told only at night when there is snow on the ground. The fifth annual Ojibwe Language Symposium at Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College attracted close to 200 participants from Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, North Dakota, and Canada Feb. 2-4. Arne and Ivy Vainio shared my table during the feast. They said conferences like this one are...
Ella Mae (Couture) Netland passed away peacefully Feb. 1, 2024 at Essentia Health in Duluth after a brief illness. She was born June 1, 1949 to David and Catherine (Church) Couture. Ella grew up in Brookston and was a proud member of the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. Ella retired from the Potlatch mill after more than 30 years there. Ella loved her daughters, granddaughters and great-grandson. She was very involved in their lives. Over the years, she had many hobbies that she...
As a former director, I have often been asked about the status of the Cloquet Forestry Center. I am not in the loop but did recently receive a copy of the University of Minnesota’s annual report, “View of the Woods,” which includes information on the forestry center. The following is taken from that report: “A focused working group of Fond du Lac and U of M representatives have been diving deeper into the details of possible collaborative research and outreach opportunities as we look into the future. This technical working group has been ch...
