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Short Films About the History of Cloquet
“There is no easy walk to freedom.” —Nelson Mandela
Cloque is a French word that means “blistered” referring to a fabric with unevenly raised surfaces. So too with our overlapping histories…
Whose stories get overlooked? And whose stories get raised up again and again?
Artist Statement
As a filmmaker I’m always looking for solid ground on which to build a story. What is the foundation of secure attachment to a place? Growing up across a Catholic Church in St. Anthony, Minnesota, I would climb on a big rock on the street corner that provided early refuge from an often chaotic world. We called it the Big Rock. In July of 2022, twenty years into my journey with documentary filmmaking, Jim Northrup III shared a joke about Sawyer, Minnesota, where he lives on Nagaajiwanaang, Fond du Lac Reservation. He pointed out the big lake on the Rez is called Big Lake, and the store in town called the Sawyer Store, and the treatment center called...you guessed it. Sawyer is a simple place; everything’s called what it is. Sometimes our words are clear enough to stand on their own. But not every rock is a sanctuary, not every story so clear—especially once you step into the mists of prophecy and beat feet on the forked roads before us. Cloquet contains many worlds, and it’s hard to know those worlds until you walk in their people’s shoes. We’ve all migrated here—that much we have in common; but our paths are not equal, our footprints not the same. It’s uneven, the pattern of storying, the pattern of making space.
It’s my greatest joy to gather these stories, to weave these patterns into a makeshift Cloquet cloak to help prepare us for the storms ahead. How can we stop and appreciate not just the people who have walked before us but the people who walk here now, and the people who will follow our footsteps once we’ve walked on?
—Augustin the Wind
Treaty People Walk
Cloquet, Minn sits in the heart of Nagaajiwanaang, home of the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. The territory was established by the 1854 Treaty of LaPoint, signed by Chief Buffalo among others. Sherry Couture walks with a ragtag fellowship of “Treaty People” to honor these foundational agreements and pray for the water. As Sherry says, quoting Jimmy Jackson: “Being Anishinaabe is not a privilege; it’s a responsibility.”
Muffler Alley
Jim Northrup III walks in the footsteps of his father along the Rez road where he grew up. As he strolls down memory lane, or “Muffler Alley” as he calls it (so named for all the mudholes), Big Jim revisits the backwoods that taught him how to live in a good way. Here he harvests teepee poles, reflecting on the funny nature of home, protection, and the trees that make him stand for the land.
End of the Lake/Real Red Dead
Nahgahchiwanaang is an Ojibwemowin word that means “Where the Waters Stop” or “End of the Lake” depending on your translation. Author Thomas D. Peacock shares stories of the Second Migration of the Anishinaabe while the games of colonization come uncannily to life.
Beside Her
Duluth is the original home for Nagaachiwanaang and remains the heart the 1854 Treaty Territory. Many residents suffer from houselessness and sleep on the streets. Grandmother Lisa Ronnquist is the voice of the voiceless, and protector of Mother Earth and all her relations. She walks the streets every day, ministering to the people that live there, enduring daily heartbreak as drug use, death, and missing Indigenous women plague the place where the water stops, with no end in sight. But look closely: there is a woman who walks always beside her.
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Blistered by Chris Tran