Editing Duluth, Minnesota (section)

===="The Untold Delights of Duluth"====
Early doubts about the Duluth area's potential were voiced in "The Untold Delights of Duluth," a speech U.S. Representative [[J. Proctor Knott]] of [[Kentucky]] gave in the U.S. House of Representatives on January 27, 1871. His speech opposing the St. Croix and Superior Land Grant lampooned Western [[boosterism]], portraying Duluth as an Eden in fantastically florid terms. The speech has been reprinted in collections of folklore and humorous speeches and is regarded as a classic.<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Untold Delights Of Duluth: {{!}} ''American Heritage''<!-- Bot generated title --> |url=http://www.americanheritage.com/content/untold-delights-duluth |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140329000721/http://www.americanheritage.com/content/untold-delights-duluth |archive-date=March 29, 2014 |access-date=November 9, 2012}}</ref> The nearby city of [[Proctor, Minnesota]], is named after Knott.

Duluth's unofficial sister city, [[Duluth, Georgia]], got its name in 1871 shortly after Knott's speech gained national attention. Prominent Georgia newspaperman and politician [[Evan Howell]] had been called upon to make remarks at the dedication of a new railroad line into Howell's Crossing, a village named for his grandfather. There, Howell humorously suggested that the community be called "Duluth" instead, and townspeople agreed.

Proctor Knott is sometimes credited with characterizing Duluth as the "zenith city of the unsalted seas," but the honor for that coinage belongs to journalist Thomas Preston Foster, who spoke at a Fourth of July picnic in 1868.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Macdonald |first=Dora Mary |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ADOlAAAACAAJ&q=This+is+duluth |title=This is Duluth |year=1999 |isbn=978-1-889924-03-8 |page=281 |publisher=Paradigm Press |access-date=October 17, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210518123101/https://books.google.com/books?id=ADOlAAAACAAJ&q=This+is+duluth |archive-date=May 18, 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref>
{{wide image|General view from bluffs, Duluth, Minn. c1898.jpg|900px|Duluth panoramic view, {{Circa|1898}}}}