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Lost Duluth
by Tony Dierckins & Maryanne C. Norton
Zenith City Press
ISBN: 978-188731738-2
$24.00 Softcover
No person lives but for ancestors long gone and no city stands but for people and their deeds from the past.
Still, if this book simply logged the buildings that no longer exist in Duluth, it could have been quite a “gotcha” of great things you can’t see.
This delivers more. While it is indeed a catalog of lost buildings and businesses, it explores history. And while the book offers platefuls of facts, it also lays out a spread of easily digested short takes and plentiful, intriguing historic photos. For those of us from Duluth or those who are new to it, this is a “family” history, alive with saints and black sheep.
The coffee-table book has a high-quality feel to its cover and interior pages – a good attribute for a book that’s sure to be paged through again and again. It’s a great holiday gift. – Konnie LeMay
Finns in Minnesota
by Arnold R. Alanen
Minnesota Historical Society Press
ISBN: 978-0-87351-854-3
$16.95 Softcover
Arnold Alanen’s research is exhaustive, his style entertaining and his ability to tell us so much in 114 pages impressive. This latest in The People of Minnesota series is an engaging account of Finnish immigration to the state since 1864.
Like most immigrants, Finns found refuge in ethnic organizations – religious, fraternal and notably political, which showed a high profile in times of labor conflict. Finnish contributions to our culture are well-covered – from the sauna to the cookbooks of Bea Ojankangas. Filled with 50 black-and-white photos and graphics, this book’s only deficiency is omission in the index of most place names, making it hard to look up Esko’s concentration of Finns or Larsmont’s enclave of Swede-Finns.
You don’t need Finn blood to enjoy this harvest of Finnish lore, spirit and tradition. – Donn Larson
Ghost Hunting on Mackinac Island
Produced by Don Hermanson
Keweenaw Video Productions
ISBN: 978-0-9826158-4-3
$19.99 DVD
For ghost-hunting fans, this visit to Mackinac Island by the Upper Peninsula Paranormal Research Society is a treat. Historian-author Todd Clements calls the island one of the world’s most haunted locations. Resident interviews reveal strange events, such as former mayor Robert “Little Bob” Hughey’s story about being pushed against a hotel wall by an unseen force that rushed down a hallway “like a team of horses.”
The core is an investigation at Mission Point Resort, at one time Mackinac College and where a student is said to have killed himself over a broken heart. The U.P.P.R.S. team sets up in the theater, where a round “orb” later rises from the seats. Green-tinted night-vision video and a synthesizer soundtrack make it more eerie. “It was creepy,” says one team member. Adds another: “You felt watched.”
Even if you don’t believe, this DVD is great fun. The U.P.P.R.S. investigators are so enthusiastic, you gotta love ’em. – Bob Berg
The items reviewed here should be available through local booksellers.