SAVING OUR BUILDING HISTORY

The Northern Bedrock Historic Preservation Corps. in Duluth has made it a mission to teach young people important building trade techniques, provide hands-on training and seek out important regional field work. The organization, which grew out of a local youth conservation corps program, was founded in 2011 and is planning its first full six-month season of restoration projects this summer.

In Duluth, the organization has restored the Civil War Soldiers and Sailors Monument outside city hall, provided interior restoration at the former St. Peter’s Church on Observation Hill (now the Great Lakes Academy of Fine Arts) and preserved aging headstones at the Adas Israel Cemetery. Youth workers have also spent time working in state parks, on county landmarks and for municipal history organizations throughout Minnesota.

Northern Bedrock Board of Directors President Cynthia Lapp said the organization not only teaches young people living skills and active skills — time-tested conservation corps hallmarks — but also points participants toward a career. “The historic preservation model is actually building trade skills for young people, so it’s actually a triple win, win, win,” she said.

The Northern Bedrock Preservation Corps was established by Rolf Hagberg, a longtime Duluth-area youth conservation corps organizer who retired in 2018. The pilot project is the only youth corps organization in the country dedicated to statewide historic building preservation.

Under the program, youths ages 18-25 sign up through Americorps for summer-long preservation projects. Northern Bedrock used 20 workers last summer; most come from Minnesota and Wisconsin but some have come from as far away as Ohio, Tennessee and Texas. Participants are dispatched in teams of six to project sites, stay and camp on the premises and earn a monthly living stipend.

Northern Bedrock is funded primarily through the Minnesota Historical Society, using Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund grant money. Hagberg said the nonprofit organization would not exists without historical society support.

“They know — No. 1 — that there is a lot of work to do on the maintenance and repair of historic properties. It just keeps growing and growing and growing,” he said. “And there’s also this diminishing pool of trades and crafts people who know how to do it.”

Lapp said youth work experience and community historical preservation are obvious program benefits. But Northern Bedrock also provides something else for a generation that has mostly grown up without learning physical, hands-on labor and craftsmanship.

“Kids don’t have very much opportunity today to have a physical influence on their communities,” she said. “There’s a lot of digital stuff, and people are in education tracks for a long time.”

Farm work, simple home improvement projects or fun construction activities are rare for youths, said Lapp. Creating a physical presence in today’s world is difficult, she said. “But I think this gives kids a unique, first opportunity to experience that.”

Board member Tim Beaster, a conservation specialist for the South St. Louis County Soil and Water District, said he found his career path working for the Minnesota Youth Conservation Corps in his early 20s.

62 And 72 Country Club Lane

Price $224,777*

“The experience changed my life,” he said. “I learned a lot skills I didn’t already have, a lot of leadership skills, getting people to show up for a job and how to work hard. I also made a lot of contacts which started me down the path I’m currently on.”

Beaster said Northern Bedrock applies the same work principles to historic preservation projects.

“We realized it was a really important thing and much needed in the state,” he said. “There’s a lot of historic buildings and cemeteries and a whole lot of history out there that’s declining and in need of work.”

Northern Bedrock Operations Manager Rhea Harvey said three Americorps crews tackled projects in 21 different communities statewide during the 2018 season. The six-member crews totaled more than 17,000 work hours on 26 historic structures, in eight cemeteries and at five archaeological digs. Recently, the organization has worked on a large archaeology project in Superior National Forest, restored a stone bridge and stockage wall at Grand Portage National Monument and repaired log buildings at the Joyce Estate in the Chippewa National Forest. The Halfway Ranger Station Historic District in Ely is used as a training facility.

Harvey said the projects introduced young people — including women and other underrepresented groups — to new careers, which could help expand and diversify the building and trade workers pool.

“It’s hard,” she said. “You want to be able to say: ‘That person looks just like me,’ but you don’t see women and people of color at the side of the curb working on construction projects much. It’s getting a little better, but we’re not there yet.”

Historic Preservation Program Manager Jessica Fortney said Northern Bedrock uses the motto: “Building a pathway to the preservation trades.” She said young people are introduced to a variety of skilled labor like carpentry, window glazing and timber framing and historical practices in archeology and cemetery restoration.

“We’re trying to get people to understand that working with your hands and in the construction trade can be very valuable and rewarding,” she said. “If you don’t think college is necessarily the right way to go, this may give you a different kind of training to work into a career.”

Fortney grew up in a family with a strong appreciation for history. She studied archeology and anthropology at the University of Minnesota Duluth but discovered she liked old buildings more than digging holes. She earned a master’s degree in historic preservation from the Clemson University in Charleston, S.C.

“I fell in love with the nonprofit realm of it and the hands-on working with different materials, such as wood, bricks and stone,” she said. “I like the connections to buildings. We all use it. We all see it in different lights. I think historic buildings show a lot of craft and skill.”

Masons didn’t have laser cutters in the 19th century, Fortney said.

“It was all done by hand,” she said. “So I have an appreciation for those past builders and what’s still standing today. I think we can learn from it. I think they all tell a story.” v

One step past the giant Cat In The Hat mural on the outside of the building and into the warm, cozy confines of Zenith Bookstore in West Duluth, one is instantly immersed in a calm, quiet atmosphere that holds infinite possibilities to learn or escape or dream through the words and pictures of thousands of authors from around the world.

The bright, quaint brick structure is decorated with colorful murals of giant books painted on the outside, exposed brick walls and century-old wood floors. Tall, wooden shelves are tightly packed with used and new books, beckoning those who walk down the sidewalk to come inside, where they’ll experience a place where everyone is welcomed by owner Bob Dobrow. He encourages customers to relax and browse through more than 25,000 book titles or spend some time connecting with or making new friends. The bookstore is the fulfillment of a lifelong dream of Dobrow and his wife, Angel, recent transplants to Duluth.

Bob is a retired professor who taught math and statistics for 20 years at Carleton College. It was a dream from his youth to open a space that would celebrate a passion for books and reading while fostering community. And so he and Angel purchased the former Wild West liquor store, which shares a parking lot with Beaner’s Central coffeehouse on Grand Avenue. They began the year-long process of remodeling the building and furnishing the store, starting with 7,000 books the couple had personally collected from years of wandering the streets of New York, browsing through book stores there. The store opened its doors on July 1, 2017.

“Opening a bookstore was always in my blood; it was a fantasy of mine, always in the back of my mind,” Dobrow said. “I never thought it would become a reality, but when it became time for retirement, it hit me like a bolt of lightning, actually, when we put it together.”

With books and information available on smartphones, tablets and other digital forms, and a period when many traditional brickand-mortar bookstores seemed to be closing, what would possess the Dobrows, originally from Boston via a 20-year teaching stop in Northfield, Minn., to move to Duluth and take a risk to pursue a full-time dream of opening a bookstore?

“What we are finding is more and more people are reacting, and there is a backlash to the Amazonation of what is going on these days, and people want more of a sense of community, and there is more of an attachment to the physical object of a book,” Dobrow said. “I think the whole e-book, Kindle phase has run its course.”

Dobrow pointed out that statistics show that there has been a significant increase in bookstores, with more stores opening in the past three or four years than have been in the last 20 years, and that there have been more book sales in that period as well. That surge is part of what has fueled the heart and vision of Zenith Bookstore.

“One of the missions for this particular bookstore in West Duluth is to be a community bookstore, to be a center for events, for community outreach,” Dobrow said.

Those type of events include adult story time, and a recent donation of more than $1,000 worth of books to the Kids Kitchen Library at the Damiano Center.

“We want to be an integral part of this community. We want to be as supportive as possible,” Dobrow said. “There is a lot happening these days in West Duluth, and we feel very proud to be a part of that.”

One of the more interesting activities at the store is the once-amonth adult book reading night. For about 60-90 minutes, the lights are turned down low, candles are scattered around, and wine and chocolates are served. The floor is strewn with pillows and blanket, and somebody reads out loud. They may read their favorite short story or passages from their favorite book. The store has also hosted local celebrities and authors such as Leif Enger.

“It’s a great experience, I think everybody loves to be read to. It’s relaxed, its social, it’s very laid back,” Dobrow said.

One of the other missions of the store is to keep books affordable. The store is comprised of 80 percent used books, many of which come from customers themselves. “We take in books, we trade, and buy used books. We are 80 percent used books. Customers bring in books. They get store credit, which gets applied to their used books purchases. We want books to be affordable because they are getting so expensive these days,” Dobrow said.

Community is a word Dobrow uses frequently to describe his heart for the business. “People want connection; they don’t want to spend their lives just clicking away on some internet site,” he said. “People come in all the time and look you in the eye and say thank you for this space, for what you are doing with the store. People really have an attachment to the store.”

Dobrow has been pleasantly surprised at both the success and support of the business. In January, they were coming off a strong holiday season in sales and were seeing a good number of customers in the store. Dobrow said they see a strong customer base from West Duluth. “Some people you see every day, every other day, once a month,” Dobrow said. Plus there has been a strong out-of-town base of people who visit Duluth once or twice a year and stop in to say they make a stop at Zenith Bookstore a part of their trip. Also, there have been a good number of connections from the eastern part of Duluth.

The store also has been recognized for its achievements in the community, winning two awards within the first year, the Northland Reader’s “Best in the Northland” award for best book store, and the Duluth News Tribune’s “Best of the Best” award for best bookstore. “I feel so humbled by this community and by our customers, they are amazing,” Dobrow said.

On a quiet winter afternoon, the store saw a trickle of customers wander up and down the shelves. UMD students Margaret Martin and Alyssa McDonald looked around and browsed through titles. They have visited the store a couple of times.

“They have a great local and regional section,” Martin said. “It’s fun to read from local artists and hear what is going on in this area.” Martin also said she really likes a unique feature of the store, notes displayed below the books from people who have read the book and leave a comment or two about the book.

There is a lilt in Dobrow’s voice and twinkle in his eye when he talks about the store. “It’s a fun place. I think it’s a very Duluthian kind of place. It has a strong, strong connection to the area; we have a very strong local and regional section”. As he watched people mill around the store, he added: “A lot of people have a stereotype of what a used bookstore is like, stacks of dusty dirty books, can’t find anything. That’s not our bookstore. It’s very clean, most of the books look they could be new books.”

As Dobrow thought for a minute, he interjected “It’s more just than a business that makes money selling books. Books are very important in people’s lives. So being a part of that and being able to do something good and worthwhile and meaningful for people and the community is a great, great experience.” v

David Ballard is a Duluth photojournalist and frequent contributor to Duluth.com.

BATHTUB REFINISHING & REPAIR

• Repair Cracked/ Weak Tub & Shower Floors

• Refinish Countertops

To a Stone Finish

Convert existing tub to easy step-in shower.

• Grab Bars Install Acrylic Bathtubs, Wall Liners & Shower Pans. Veteran Owned by